Uncharted Territory
by daynaa
Summary: WoodyJordan BugLily fic., post JPF. CHAPTER 25 up
1. Talking with Lily

Please review! It won't take too long, and I just want to know what you honestly think of my story! Give me suggestions on what you want to see happen, and I'll incorporate your suggestions. I'm not very talented at judging how my story is comming along, so it would help greatly if you could give me some feedback! Thanks, and enjoy!

Chapter ONE

It had been about a week since Woody turned Jordan away at the hospital. For Woody, it felt like it had been years. Why, of all the possible times she could have chosen to listen to him, did she pick that moment to listen to him, to do what he wanted? Well damn her for it. If she loved him, she would have protested. Stayed! Done anything other than leave. He didn't truly believe that, but he did believe that trying to believe that would be the only way to ever move on with his life. Life without Jordan Cavanaugh. Now that was a scary thought. She had been more than a small part of his life for the last four years, and now she was gone. Well, she wasn't really gone. He only thought about her every second of the day, and dreamed about her every night. She was still very much with him, just not physically. She would be, but because of him, she wasn't. He hated to think of all the things she could (but he doubted) be doing now. After only a week, she still could have found a new guy, anyone, that wouldn't turn her away like that. But what was he thinking? Who was the one who turned away from their relationship for the past four years? It was her. Who could never say what he wanted to hear, even after he said it to her? Jordan. As much as he hated to admit it, in his mind, he knew that he needed her now, more than ever, and he had sent her away. "Oh well, at least I'll be out of here, and able to check up on her within the next week or so" he told himself. Then, a nurse came in with his supper, which always came with some polite conversation, so he tried, as hard as he could, to push her face out of his head, but he knew it would never go away. Never.

Jordan sat at her desk finishing up some paperwork on the body she had just autopsied. As she sat, slowly writing her report, she heard a knock on the door. She didn't look up, but replied "Come in" in a low, soft voice. She didn't care who had come to see her. She didn't care about anything anymore, not since she had left that hospital a week ago.

"Jordan, we need to talk." Lily said. Jordan was in no mood to talk. She was in no mood to do anything but do her paperwork, and go home. That's all she had done for the last week, and Slokum was quite happy with it. At least it kept him off her case, because that was the last thing she needed.

"About what?" Jordan asked, although she was quite aware of what Lily was going to say.

"Jordan, you can't keep avoiding this issue. You've been doing nothing but acting un-Jordan like ever since you came back to work from seeing Woody at the hospital that day, now are you going to talk to me about it, or are you going to wait, and let things get worse, and then talk to me about it?" Lily told Jordan, her voice raising the slightest bit. Jordan got up, walked across the room, and shut the door tightly.

"Fine" She said, sitting back down, "What do you want to know, that you haven't already assumed, or figured out?" Lily just sat there for a moment, forming in her head the right words to say. Well, it was more like thinking of words to say. Talking to Jordan now-a-days wasn't an easy thing to do, and Jordan sure as hell wasn't going to help her out here. She'd have to ask the right questions, and get Jordan to talk.

"Well, can you tell me exactly what happened at the hospital that day for starters?" Lily said, finally coming up with words. Lily sensed something in Jordan change, like she tightened up even tighter than she had been before the question was asked. Then, for the first time since Lily had entered the room, Jordan looked up, and looked Lily straight in the eye. Lily looked back at Jordan, a bit surprised to see tears forming in her eyes.

"Well, it's pretty simple actually," Jordan started, "I went into the room, and started casual conversation. Woody just looked at me for a while, and didn't say anything. Then he started talking about what I had said before, when he was coming into the hospital in the first place, and said that I said what I said because I felt sorry for him, and told me to leave." Tears started rolling down Jordan's cheeks. "I…I just didn't know what to say. I stood there for a minute, looking at Woody, wondering how I could convince him that I really meant it. I did mean it. I meant every word of it, and I don't know how he could think otherwise, so I left. I left, and I never went back, and I still haven't gone back, because for once, I'm going to do as Woody asks." Lily sat there for a moment, taking in the information she had just received. She again, was at a loss for words. She hadn't expected Jordan to tell her that much, that quickly and without a fight. She just looked at Jordan for another minute and then finally she decided she had to say something.

"Jordan, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I don't understand why Woody wouldn't believe you; it isn't like him to do something like that. It was probably just because he was confused. He didn't know exactly what was going on, and he was on so many pills, and tired from just coming out of surgery. I think you should go talk to him. I mean, he's probably lonely at the hospital, and I'll bet he's thinking about you just as much as you're thinking about him." Jordan looked up and sort of smiled.

"You think?" she asked, in a sort of shy voice Lily didn't think she'd ever heard come from her friend before.

"Yeah, I do." Lily answered her. "When are you off?"

"Right as soon as I finish this paperwork." Jordan told her.

"Alright, finish it quickly, and we'll head over to the hospital before visiting hours end. Sound alright?" Lily asked, hoping to god that the answer would be some sort of positive indication.

"Yeah, sure." Jordan told her, giving her a hug. Lily turned to leave, and just as she was heading out the door Jordan called after her "Thanks." Lily smiled and shut the door behind her.


	2. Earth to Jordan

After supper at the hospital, Woody sat there staring into space as he had every night (and day for that matter) since he was shot. He just sat, and thought about what? Jordan. What else? He couldn't believe he had turned her away. Even if she was just pitying him, he could have just pretended and let her stay for a little while anyways. He had messed things up, and now he doubted he would ever get another chance. How could he have done this to himself? He just couldn't wait to get out of the hospital to see Jordan, even if it was just from afar, to see just how much damaged he had caused. Little did he know that he wouldn't have to wait quite that long to see.

"Alright Lily, I'm ready to go." Jordan announced as she stopped in the doorway to Lily's office. She had just dropped off her paperwork for Slokum, who was thankfully on the phone and couldn't ask her to stay longer. Although she would never show it, she was terrified of going to see Woody. It was true that she couldn't stop thinking about him ever since she left that hospital room, but how much thinking had she actually been doing? She didn't know what she was going to say. Oh god, she had no clue what she was going to say. She just hoped that it would all work out in the end, even though it never had before, and she guessed it never would. Deep inside, she had this feeling, this feeling of loss. That was the worst feeling in the world for her, losing someone she loved, but at least this time, it wouldn't be entirely all her fault. Woody didn't have to turn her away, he could have invited her in, but that's just the way things worked out for her. The way they always had, and the way she presumed they always would.

"Earth to Jordan!" Lily was tapping Jordan on the shoulder trying to shake her out of her little day dream. Jordan finally shook her head and looked at Lily. "Let's go to my car, we can come back for yours later, alright?" Jordan nodded her head and they headed to the car.


	3. She misses you

"Detective, you have some visitors." Woody's nurse poked her head in the door. "Are you up for some company?" Woody just blinked and looked at her for a second. Who had come to see him? He had turned everyone away. He knew exactly who he desperately wanted, and needed it to be, but he knew it wasn't her. It couldn't be her. He finally nodded and the nurse opened the door. It was Lily. She saw the look of excitement and anticipation on his face slowly leave as he saw it wasn't Jordan.

"Hey Woody." Lily said softly, "How have you been doing?" Woody sighed and closed his eyes for a minute. Of course it would be Lily. Who else would care enough to come back? A voice deep in the back of his mind answered, well apparently not Jordan, but he regretted the though right away. She would be here, he told himself, she would be, but he had told her not to be. Then he remembered Lily, and quickly opened his eyes.

"I've been alright." He told her. "How have you and people been?" He asked in return, regretting it as soon as it had left his lips. Of course Lily would know who he meant exactly by people, but luckily, it was Lily and she just smiled.

"I'm good, and people, well people have been a little depressed." Lily answered him with a tiny smile, as if to confirm his suspicions that she knew exactly who he was talking about.

"Was it that obvious?" He asked, cringing. Lily laughed.

"Yeah." She said. "Jordan really misses you, I can tell. I'm guessing you miss her as well?" Woody smiled. What a question. Did he miss Jordan Cavanaugh? Well, it was sort of obvious he did, and Lily would know he was lying if he said no, and besides, Jordan missed him, just thinking about it sent chills of happiness up his spine. Jordan missed him. "Woody? You there?" Lily asked again with a smile. She already knew the answer was yes, so she didn't know why he was so hesitant to admit it. Woody gave her a small smile.

"Okay. Yes. I'm still in love with Jordan." Woody confided to Lily. Lily smiled again as she watched Woody realized that wasn't the question she had asked. She had asked if he missed Jordan, not if he was in love with her, but his answer sort of went for both.

"She really did mean what she said Woody, you know that don't you? It was just a matter of bad timing when she realized it. She wanted to tell you all along, but somehow she just couldn't. She needed to tell you before it were too late, that's the reason she told you then. Not whatever reasons you thought." Lily informed Woody on information she knew, in her heart, was true, but had not yet been confirmed by Jordan. Woody looked astonished, happy and angry all in one, and it made him look so cute. Jordan was watching, and listening, from the other side of the thin hospital walls. She peeked in at that moment to see his expression. She had to. He looked adorable, realizing what he had done to her. She didn't know what to do next. How had Lily known how she felt? And what to say? Oh well, she had done it, and this was her chance. She took a few steps, and put her hand on the door knob. She turned, and pulled. Lily smiled as she heard the door open behind her. Woody looked up with amazement to see the Jordan Cavanaugh smile he loved so much.


	4. I promise

"Hey Woods." She said quietly, not meeting his eyes. She knew the moment she did; she couldn't say what she needed to say, even though she wasn't sure at all what that was..

"Hey." He answered her, speaking as quietly and shyly as she had. He looked up, but Jordan was still staring at the floor, so he stared down at the hospital sheets. He heard Lily move toward the door. She left. Great. He and Jordan were left alone to talk, but neither of them knew what to say, or how the other would react. Jordan sensed that Woody knew exactly how she felt, so she sat down on the chair. She could never remember such awkwardness between the two of them. Finally, she realized one of them had to say something, and even though Woody was the one who had pushed her away, she knew very well she had pushed him away many times, so she might as well talk to him. The situation between them couldn't get any worse.

"Look Woody. I know you probably won't believe me, but when I said what I said to you, I really did mean every word of it. You didn't believe me before, so I don't expect you to believe me now, but I'm telling you the truth. I'm sorry that I told you at such an awkward time, but it could have been the last time I ever got to talk to you. I have known I loved you for a long time. I just couldn't say it before. I was afraid, but I was even more afraid of not ever getting the chance to tell you, and living my whole life knowing that I should have. I'm sorry." Tears welled up in Jordan's eyes as she slouched down in the chair. What would Woody say? She couldn't bring herself to look at him. She didn't know how he would react, but she knew how she wanted him to.

"Jordan…" Woody started, and then stopped. He started thinking about what to say next. She must think I'm either still angry at her, and don't believe her, or that I'm a complete loser, he thought. What could he say in response to what she had said? Jordan had just told him exactly what he had wanted to hear, and she was telling the truth. She had told him before, and she could have been with him, helping him through this the whole time, but he had to be a jerk. He had to turn her away. What was he thinking? It wasn't as if he hadn't thought about all of this a million times, it was just that in his mind, he had never thought Jordan would come here and tell him this. He had planned on going and finding her, and he planned on starting the conversation. He never planned on being in this situation. He knew what he had to tell her. He had to tell her how he felt. He knew it would sound dumb. He could picture it now. Jordan, I love you. I've loved you for the last four years, and I always will love you. I never in a million years thought you would say that you loved me, and you did. Finally, you did. And I pushed you away. Pushed you away like you pushed me away as soon as we got too close. I hated it, when you pushed me away, which makes it even harder for me to explain why I pushed you away. And the truth is, I don't know. I haven't the slightest clue why I didn't believe you. Why I didn't say I love you too, and gave us a chance. I just don't know, and I'm sorry if that's not enough for you. But he couldn't say it. She would leave him, and find someone better. He knew it. What to say, what could he say?

"It's okay Woody." Jordan said, "I get it. I'll go."

"No Jordan, don't." Woody told her, a little louder than he had intended. "Please don't." He said again, quieter this time. Jordan, who was halfway to the door turned around and looked him right in the eye. There was no escaping it. He had to say something, and he knew it.

"Why Woody? Why should I stay? You haven't said a word. Why can't you tell me what you're thinking, and I know you're thinking about something." She asked him. Woody gave her a small smile.

"Promise you won't go if I tell you?" He asked, and Jordan nodded. "Alright then. I'll tell you everything I want to stay, but you can't get mad, and leave."

"I won't. I promise." Jordan told him, smiling. Woody nodded and then brought up his courage.

"Jordan, I love you. I've loved you for the last four years, and I always will love you. I never in a million years thought you would say that you loved me, and you did. Finally, you did. And I pushed you away. Pushed you away like you pushed me away as soon as we got too close. I hated it, when you pushed me away, which makes it even harder for me to explain why I pushed you away. And the truth is, I don't know. I haven't the slightest clue why I didn't believe you. Why I didn't say I love you too, and gave us a chance. I just don't know, and I'm sorry if that's not enough for you." Jordan opened her mouth several times while he was speaking, and shut it again, not wanting to interrupt. He was afraid she'd get mad and leave when he said this? How could she? He had just told her that he loved her, always had and always will. Wasn't that what every girl wanted to hear from the man they loved? She wasn't exactly sure why he had pushed her away without any reason, but she guessed it was just all the stress, drugs in his system and he was just overwhelmed.

"Woody, I could never walk away from you after you told me that." Jordan told him, tears in her eyes once again. "I love you too; it just took me a long while to say it." Woody smiled, very surprised at Jordan. It wasn't like her to not ask anymore questions, and to say I love you to him again. Maybe she just wanted to give them a chance like he did. Maybe they did have a chance. But if Jordan wasn't going to ask any more questions, he was only going to ask one.

"Jordan, why did you push me away all those times I wanted to be with you if you loved me?" He hoped she wouldn't change her mind after he asked that, but he had to.

"Well… it's not really all that complicated I guess." She said, "I… well I was just afraid that we'd be together for a few weeks, and then you'd leave me for someone else. I didn't want you to leave me, ever… and…" She was about to continue when Woody cut in.

"I won't ever leave you Jordan. I won't. I promise you." Jordan looked up at him, tears rolling down her cheeks. Could she trust him? The one man who had always been there for her throughout the four years she had known him. It was a hard decision to make. She had to decided, then and there. There was no more running like she always had. No more pushing away. Woody promised her, but was she ready to commit to being with him?


	5. What really makes me scared

Wood continued to stare directly at her while she tried to quickly sort out all of her thoughts. If she told him she needed time to think about it, he'd assume she was running away again. Pushing him out of her life because he was trying to make her commit. She couldn't do that to him. Not now, not again. The thing that she was scared of wasn't commitment. She was scared of truly confiding in someone, telling them the complete truth, and then being turned away. That's what Woody had done to her in the same hospital room a week ago. That's why it was so hard to tell him that she wouldn't leave him either. That's the most she could make of it, and the only thing she could think of to say right then, so she decided to say it. She smiled, took a deep breathe and said, "I'm glad to hear that Woody, really, I am. It's just, it's not 'commitment' I'm scared of. It's that when I tell someone the complete truth, straight on. When I tell them exactly how I feel, and want to be with them, and they turn me away." Woody looked down again. Now it was his turn to think. It all came down to a week ago. How could he have been so stupid? The one thing Jordan was really afraid of, he had gone and done. They had been through so much together. So many situations, so many memories, but none of them would come close to this. No matter how this discussion ended, good or bad, he bet neither one of them would ever forget it.

"Jordan, I'm sorry. You don't know how sorry I am. I don't know what came over me. I don't know why I thought you were just saying that, I just don't know. For the past week, I have though of nothing but you. Your smile, your amazing personality, just you. I've sat in this bed, stared at that wall and thought about you. Dreamt about you. I'm so much in love with you, you probably wouldn't believe it." Jordan smiled. She glanced at her watch and realized they wouldn't have much visiting time left.

"I do believe it Woody, because I've been the same way, except I couldn't get you out of my head. Visiting hours is almost over, so we're going to have to say goodbye for tonight, but I'll come back tomorrow to check on you, okay?"

"Yeah, sounds good." Woody agreed. With the progression in their relationship they had made that night, Jordan would have felt awkward leaving it at that, and since Woody didn't have much choice in the matter, she walked over and gave him a soft kiss on the cheek.

"See you in the morning Detective." Jordan said with a sly smile playing around her lips.

"Yes. I'll be here Dr., see you then." Woody answered her with a smile of his own. He couldn't wait for the morning.


	6. I think I might love him

"What happened in there?" An excited Lily asked as soon as Jordan had taken two steps away from the door.

"A lot." Jordan said with a smile. "A hell of a lot."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Lily questioned, with a grin, knowing it had turned out well by the look on Jordan's face.

"Let's just say I'll be taking the morning off tomorrow, and no ass of a doctor named Slokum is going to stop me." Jordan laughed.

"Oh Jordan, that's great!" Lily said. She was really happy for Jordan and Woody. They belonged together. Anyone could tell that! "But what happened exactly?" Lily asked eagerly. She couldn't wait to hear all the details of how this enormous problem between the two was fixed.

"Well, you set it up very nicely." Jordan told her, "How did you know exactly how I felt Lily? You were right, of course, but I never told you any of that stuff." Lily just smiled, urging Jordan to continue. "Okay, okay. I'll tell you the whole story, as long as you answer that after I'm done." So Jordan proceeded to tell Lily exactly what went on inside that hospital room. Lily smiled, and listened intently as she drove back towards the morgue. Right as she pulled into the parking garage and Jordan finished her story, with the description of the light kiss on the cheek she had said goodnight to Woody with, Lily's car stalled, and then stopped. "What's wrong?"

"I'm not sure. My car just stopped." Lily answered.

"That's okay. My car's right over there, we can call a tow truck, and I'll give you a ride home."

"Well, actually, I have some paperwork and that I can just catch up on. I'll call the tow trucking people, have them come out here and take a look, and tell me how long it'll take. I can take a cab home or whatever later."

"You sure?" Jordan asked.

"Yeah, it's fine. See you tomorrow?" Lily told her, as they both got out of the car.

"Yeah, if I don't take the whole day off" Jordan laughed. "Have fun with Slokum and Nigel up there. Don't have too much fun." Jordan joked, but Lily smiled slightly, but she looked a bit confused. "Something wrong?" Jordan asked.

"No… nothing… it's just, I thought Bug was working tonight?" Lily said, trying to sound like she was innocently confused by the mix up of who was working.

"Oh yeah! That's right, he is. Sorry about that one." Jordan laughed; getting the feeling Lily didn't have that much paperwork after all. "Is something going on between you two?" Jordan asked, showing her sly smile for the second time that evening.

"No, nothing at all, why would you think that?" Lily answered, quickly and defensively.

"Oh, no reason at all." Jordan told her, still smiling. "But you'd tell me if there was, wouldn't you?" When Lily didn't answer at first, Jordan's smile grew even bigger. There was something going on between Bug and Lily! She knew it. After all the relationship help Lily had given Jordan that day, maybe it was time for some in return. "Lily, you know you can tell me if there is. It's not like I'm going to react weirdly to you two having a relationship…" Jordan said.

"Well, we don't have a relationship," Lily told her with a bit of a sigh, "But I don't know. Sometimes I wonder how much I wish we did. I don't know, I'm about as confused as you were with Woody, except he doesn't love me, and I don't know if I love him, and we haven't had any past together and…" Jordan cut her off.

"There's quite a lot of uncertainty in this isn't there? How do you know Bug doesn't love you? I mean, I've seen the way he looks at you, and talks about you. I'd say there's quite a possibility. Maybe you guys just need to have a little talk. How about we both go do some "paperwork" and maybe you'll end up with a date." Jordan suggested. Lily smiled at her friend. Jordan was right. Who said Bug didn't love her, or couldn't love her? Anything was possible; they might-as-well give it a shot.

"After you Dr. Cavanaugh" Lily said motioning to the door. She picked up her cell phone and called a tow truck from the elevator, and by the time they were on their floor a tow truck was on its way to get Lily's car.


	7. Detective Jake

"What are you two doing here, I thought you went home?" A confused Slokum asked as he saw them pass by his office. "Up to no good I assume?"

"No, we're just here to get a head start on some paperwork, I mean, we really have nothing better to do." Lily told him with a little smile.

"Well, as long as your hear, get to work." He instructed them. Jordan opened her mouth to give a snide reply and then closed it.

"Will do." She told him. Slokum gave the two girls a perplexed look, and got back to work. Jordan headed to her office and Lily did the same. They weren't exactly sure what they were going to do to find out if Bug liked Lily as more than a friend, but they had to do something. Jordan's chance to help Lily came when Slokum knocked on her office door. "Come in." She called after a minute of making him stand there.

"You're services are needed in Trace" He told her, "There's been what appears to be a double homicide coming in, so you and Bug can work together on this one. I have some other business to attend to." With that, he left. Jordan got up, and smiled. Before heading into trace, she stopped in at Lily's office.

"Guess who's going into what could be doing hours worth of forensic investigating with you-know-who?" Jordan joked. Lily looked up and smiled.

"Oh, I couldn't. Just don't say anything that is too obvious, is going to make him feel uncomfortable or will make me feel uncomfortable at a later time please." Lily advised.

"Who me? I wouldn't dare!" Jordan laughed, shutting the door as she left. Lily shook her head, and got back to work. Jordan headed to trace to set things up. Bug had gone to the scene of the crime and Jordan set up in trace and waited. Finally, Bug and the bodies arrived. A detective named Jake Fredrick came with him. Detective Jake was Woody's replacement on the force until Woody was able to make a full recovery. Jordan had a hard time at first, because still all she could think about after she met Detective Jake was Woody, and how she wished he was on the case with her. For two hours, Detective Jake, Jordan and Bug worked hard to get any leads on who had committed this double homicide, and who the victims were. Finally, after two hours, Jordan had a chance to talk to Bug about Lily. Jake had just left to go get them some more coffee since the machine in the break room was broken, and Bug said he needed a break. Jordan followed him into the break room, where she planned to start her interrogation. But, Bug decided to start a nice conversation before Jordan got the chance to.

"So, Jordan, Detective Jake seems nice." Bug said. Jordan nodded.

"Yes. Yes, he does."

"He seems to be quite fond of you, if you know what I mean" Bug said smugly, assuming she knew. Jordan was a bit puzzled.

"What do you mean by that?" Jordan asked him.

"You hadn't noticed?" Bug asked her with a bit of sarcasm.

"I haven't the slightest clue what you're talking about Bug." Jordan told him, "But would you please just tell me? I really want to know." Well, I really want to get this conversation over so I can ask you who you're quite fond of, Jordan added in her head.

"So you're telling me you haven't noticed how Detective Jake looks at you, and talks to you? And that he's pretty much "in love?" with you" He said, emphasizing the "in love" part with a smile.

"What? No! I wasn't paying attention at all! Seriously Bug, I have many other very important things on my mind that are certainly not the new detective, thank you very much." Jordan told him, "and how would you know what a guy looks like when he's looking at someone who he is "in love" with anyways?" Jordan questioned Bug, liking how this situation was working out to her advantage.

"Because it's the exact same way I look at…" Bug said, so caught up in the conversation, he was hardly paying attention to what he was talking about. He caught himself before the name was out of his mouth. "Never mind."

"No, Bug, not never mind! Who do you look at that way?" Jordan asked with a small encouraging smile, as if to tell Bug he could trust her with the information. So far, she hadn't really broken any of Lily's interrogation rules. And by the looks of it, she wouldn't have to. This must be her lucky day.

"You'd think it was dumb." He told her, "You wouldn't understand."

"What's with guys and thinking their feelings are dumb. I will understand perfectly Bug, so just tell me." It's not like I don't know whose name you're going to say, she added in her head.

"Fine." He said giving her a quizzical look. She guessed he was wondering how many other guys Jordan had been giving love advice to that day. She had guessed right, but Bug didn't even want to know. "It's… Lily." Jordan smiled.

"I knew it!" She exclaimed triumphantly. "Now that wasn't so hard was it?"  
"Well, no I guess not…" Bug said.

"So now, you just have to go ask her out." Jordan told him, "Then you'll have no regrets. Trust me. It's better to do it now then four years from now. It will make things a lot easier." Bug gave her another quizzical look, and then dismissed the thought. He got the hint now that she was talking about her and Woody's relationship, but he really didn't want to get into that very delicate topic right then.

"Ask her out?" He said, "Uh… No. I don't think so. She'd never go out with me. She's beautiful, and smart, and funny…" Bug probably would have continued on and on with a very long list, so Jordan cut him off.

"How do you know she doesn't feel the same way about you?" She said, in a sing song voice. Bug sensed that Jordan had history in discussing the topic of him and Lily, and he guessed it was with Lily, since it wasn't with him.

"What do you know about me and Lily that I don't know?" He demanded. Jordan smiled.

"My lips are sealed."

"Then I guess you're not going to find out what Detective Jake said about you." He told her smugly, knowing that he'd gotten her there.

"Fine, fine. But, I'm telling you for your own good… not because I want to know what Jake said. Lily, well… she likes you too. A lot. She feels about the same way about you two as you do. She didn't think you would like her that way at all, and she would never ask you out because she'd be to scared you'd say no."

"But that's crazy! She's absolutely amazing! Why would anyone ever say no to her?" Bug exclaimed. "I'll ask her out once our shift is done tonight, alright?" Jordan nodded and Bug continued with his part of the deal. "Well, when you went to run those DNA tests on our victim… Detective and I started talking, and the subject of you came up." Jordan raised her eyebrow and kept listening. "He didn't have too many questions about you, the only one was basically, were you single? He did have a lot to say though. I don't even want to repeat it because I truly would not feel comfortable." Jordan laughed at Bug's expression there, but she wondered what exactly had Detective Jake been saying about her? "Well I will say this. Is being in love with Dr. Jordan Cavanaugh part of that job description or what? Woody and now Jake. Geeze Jordan, you have a way with detectives." They both laughed at that, and headed back to trace.


	8. Something to eat

They met Detective Jake in the hallway on their way back to trace. He handed them each a coffee. "One for you Bug, and one for you Jordan. Is it okay if I call you Jordan, or do you prefer Dr. Cavanaugh?" Jake asked in a hurry after he realized he had called her by her first name.

"Jordan is fine." She answered him with a smile. She noticed now that he did seem unusually jumpy and nervous when he talked to her. She looked at Bug who gave her an 'I told you so' look. She smiled and rolled her eyes as they headed back into trace. After a few hours more of work, they decided the case couldn't be cracked until morning where they had Nigel's professional computer skills to use. Jordan headed back to her office, and smiled as she saw Bug head to Lily's. She started shuffling some paperwork around on her desk when she heard a knock on the door. She expected it to be Slokum, Lily or Bug, but when it was Detective Jake, she was a bit surprised. "Hey, what's up?" She asked him with a smile.

"Nothing really." He answered her, with a half smile back. "Look, I was just wondering, are you doing anything tonight? Would you want to go out for something to eat?" Jordan started shuffling the papers around again. She knew she didn't want to. She really wanted to go home to sleep and wake up in the morning, and see Woody. She thought about saying no, but she didn't want to get off on the wrong foot. He probably just meant it as a friendly gesture, although she knew it was what he wanted to be the start of more. She knew she shouldn't say what she was about to say next for many, many reasons, but she was going to anyways.

"Um, sure. Actually, I think Lily and Bug might be going out for something to eat, let's go see if we can join them." For a minute, it looked as if Jake was going to protest, but he didn't. From what he'd heard around the station about Jordan he guessed that was the best offer he was going to get for now, so he'd take it. The two headed towards Lily's office. As they approached, Jordan glanced through the window and saw her two friends deep in discussion. She hated to interrupt, but it was for a good cause. She couldn't handle dinner alone with Jake. She shouldn't either. Not after she had just sort of agreed to commit to be with Woody. "Hey Lily, hey Bug." Jordan said, poking her head into Lily's office. Lily and Bug stopped talking and looked over at Jordan. They were both smiling more genuinely then she'd seen either of them smile in a while. Maybe things were going to change around here. As soon as they could get Garrett back…

"Hey Jordan." Lily said getting up. Jordan opened up the door, and she and Jake went into the office. "And hello to you to. My name's Lily Lebowski and I'm a grief councilor at the morgue." She told Jake, who she hadn't yet met.

"Hey, I'm Detective Jake Fredrick, I'm a detective." He said with a smile. "I heard you two might be going out for something to eat?" He hinted, "May we join you?" Lily and Bug looked at each other and shrugged. Jordan peeked over Jake's shoulder and made a 'Sorry for wrecking your plans' face.

"Sure." Bug said, "Not a problem."

"We were thinking of going to that new coffee shop down the street, so meet you two there in a few minutes?" Lily suggested.

"Sounds good. See you all there." Jake answered. And with that, Jake and Jordan left for the elevator, leaving Lily and Bug to finish up their conversation.


	9. I've heard some things

"So, this coffee shop is just down the street?" Jake asked Jordan as they entered the elevator.

"Yeah, on the corner of the next block." She told him, "It's probably easier if we just walk, and come back for our cars after." He nodded as they got out of the elevator, and headed outside. Once they hit the street, they felt a cold wind hit them. Jordan pulled her sweater around her tighter as they headed down the street. Jake wasn't exactly sure where they were going, or how long it would be before they got there. All he could think about was if he should hold Jordan's hand or not. He knew that Jordan and the detective he was filling in for, Woody Hoyt, had been going out for something like four years, and they had recently stopped talking, so he assumed that Jordan would need some comforting, and he sure wouldn't mind. Whoever Woody was, he was lucky, holding onto Jordan for four years. She was beautiful, absolutely beautiful. And she was also smart he now knew, from the last few hours he had spent with her. He also knew that she didn't let people tell her what to do, which was why he was having such a debate about whether or not to make the move to hold her hand. "So, how long have you been in Boston?" She asked him after a few moments of silence. She didn't know what Jake was so deep in thought about, but all she could think about was Woody.

"Oh… Boston? I've been here a few weeks. I heard they were looking for a new detective here, so I decided to fly up, and see if I could get the job." He told here.

"How do you like it?" She asked, desperately trying to make small conversation. Jake decided to just go for it. This could be the perfect opportunity.

"It's great. So much fun." He said. At the same moment, he stepped the slightest bit closer to her, and let his hand touch hers. Jordan was surprised to feel the touch of his hand. She hadn't expected it at all. She didn't know what to do. This, she thought to herself, was exactly why she loved having Woody. Woody would have never done something like this to her, and put her in such an awkward position. If she pulled her hand away, she'd have to explain the whole situation about her and Woody to Jake, and that could take a long, long, long time, but on the other hand, if she did take his hand, and Woody heard about it, that would just be another problem for the two of them. She decided she couldn't take that small risk.

"Look Jake. I know you're new in Boston, and on the force, so you don't know much about me, but I sort of have a boyfriend." She told him, trying not to smile when she referred to Woody as her boyfriend. She glanced over at him, and he looked sort of crushed. It was a weird feeling for Jordan, turning down a guy other than Woody.

"Oh… sorry." He said, "I didn't realize you would have moved on so quickly…" Then he stopped himself. He didn't want to let her know that he knew about her relationship with Woody. She sure had moved on fast though. Finding a new boyfriend a week after she broke up with him?

"Moved on?" Jordan asked him, in a bit of a harsher tone. How would he know anything about her moving on? He had just moved to Boston a few weeks ago, and she hadn't known he'd existed before that night. She looked straight at him, realizing she had stopped walking.

"Well… I've just heard some things around the station. You know, about the guy that had the job before me. Some people just mentioned a few things about him, and you, to me. That's all." Jake told her quickly. Damn. Had he just ruined every chance of them even having a friendship? Yeah, he told himself, realizing he'd probably wrecked the chance of them being on the terms of friendly co-workers, who made small talk in the office. Jordan shook her head with a smile.

"You heard some things?" She chuckled. "Damn them. Half the people who work there don't know a thing about me, especially things about the guy who had the job before you, and me."

"Look Jordan, I'm sorry." Jake pleaded.

"I know, it's just, well, when we cross the street and are in that coffee shop, could you tell me exactly what people have been saying about me and him?" She asked with a friendly smile.

"Sure. Let's go." Jake suggested, smiling back. Maybe they could be at least friends after all.

"Maybe we should head to that coffee shop." Lily suggested. Jordan and the new detective had left about ten or fifteen minutes beforehand. Her and Bug had sat in her office and hadn't said much. Lily couldn't believe how the night had played out. First, she had helped Jordan and Woody patch things up, and then Jordan had helped her and Bug discover that they were both in love with each other. It was incredible. If only Dr. Macy would come back, things would be perfect. Lily just hoped that that new detective Jake didn't screw things up. She saw they way he looked at Jordan, and Lily knew Jordan wouldn't have asked if she and Jake could join her and Bug, unless Jake had asked her to do something, and she didn't want to do anything with him one on one. That was just the way Jordan was. Of course, Lily was a bit disappointed that her and Bug wouldn't be alone on their "first date", but I guess now, it wasn't really their first date. Lily couldn't count how many times she had gone out for coffee with Bug, Jordan, Nigel and Garret. This would be no different than that, really. Well, except for the fact that Bug actually loved her back. Everything was different now, but a good kind of different. Bug finally nodded, and she grabbed her purse. They left her office, and headed to the elevator. Bug could tell that for the first little while, things would be a bit awkward. Since he and Lily had discovered they actually loved each other, and this wasn't just a little crush, he wasn't sure how to act. Was he supposed to hold her hand? Or was he supposed to stand next to her like he always had? He almost laughed aloud after realizing the questions he was asking himself. He was being way too paranoid. They got out of the elevator, and Lily told him how her car had to be towed.

"We'll take my car then." He told her with a smile. She smiled back, and with that, they were on their way to the coffee shop.


	10. Tell you later

CHAPTER TEN

"Wait- let me get this straight. You got the idea that Woody and I were going out for the last four years, and we broke up when he got shot?" Jordan asked. She couldn't believe it. How many people had been thinking that Jordan and Woody were a 'couple' every time they saw them? She started to get a little embarrassed. She saw how their little 'today we're friends, tomorrow we're more' game could have confused people. Oh well, it was starting to look as if they were going to end up together anyway, so who cared what people thought?

"Um, yeah, from what I've heard anyway." Jake answered her, not knowing whether she was going to laugh it off or be angry. Jordan noticed him analyzing her behavior, looking for clues as to how she was handling the news flash.

"That's crazy. Woody and I, well… I don't know." She said. How much information did she really want to share with Woody's replacement on the force? She could go into a long, detailed story about their relationship for the last four years, or she could just say that is was a long, complicated story, or she could just shut-up. As she was weighing her options, and their consequences, Jake started to wonder where Bug and Lily were. He doubted Jordan would be able to provide him any insight, but he decided to ask anyway.

"Where are Bug and Lily?" He said. Jordan had forgotten all about her friends.

"I have no clue. They must have got caught up. They should be here soon." She told him. She wondered what they could be doing. She looked out the window of the little coffee shop and saw them heading down the street, hand in hand. "Look" She told Jake, sort of pointing to Lily and Bug with a smile.

"They make a cute couple." He said. "So who's your new boyfriend?" He asked her. She was a bit surprised by the question. It was a little bit of a shock, him just asking that. Jordan wasn't used to talking to such upfront people. She guessed it was a bit like talking to herself. At first she'd wondered why he'd ask about her new boyfriend… but then she remembered when he tried to hold her hand, and she'd told him she sort of had a boyfriend. He must have guessed she'd already found someone knew. Showed how much he knew about her.

"Oh… my new boyfriend? Well, it's Woody." She told him, straight out. Now he looked a little surprised.

"Woody?" He asked, "I thought… everyone said you two were broken up."

"Yes, but everyone also said that we were going out for four years." She told him. She'd have to tell him the whole story, because he was very, very confused. It wouldn't be fair not to. But, she wouldn't have time now, since the morgue's newest couple had just entered the café. They both looked so happy, and that made Jordan happy. Jake was right, they did make a cute couple. She waved them over and they sat down.

"What new?" Lily asked after they got settled in. She couldn't remember feeling so happy in a long time. Jordan considered telling her: Oh, nothing really. I just found out that Jake here has a crush on me and a lot of people that worked with Woody got the idea that we'd been in a relationship, by which I mean more than friends, for the last four years. But, for the sake of her and Jake's embarrassment, she decided to tell Lily in private later.

"Nothing really. You?" Jordan asked with a half smile. Lily could tell by the look Jordan gave her when she said nothing, that there was a little something, and Jordan then mouthed, tell you later, to Lily before glancing over at Jake. Bug felt Lily squeeze her hand, and her smile grew even wider. Then, the waiter came over to take their orders. After much more conversation about nothing in particular, and some talk about how much they all hate Slokum, they were finished their drinks, and noticing the time, decided they should get back to their cars. On the way back to the morgue parking garage, Lily and Bug walked ahead, holding hands, looking as happy as they had all night. Jordan and Jake walked silently behind. Jordan knew she was going to have to tell Jake all about her and Woody, or he might be confused and feel awkward every time they had to work together, which would be a lot. She didn't have the energy to get into that topic right then, so she just kept her mouth shut. She needed to get home to bed so she could see Woody tomorrow. When they finally made it to the parking garage, Lily and Bug were laughing together about something, and Jake and Jordan were still very silent.

"So, I guess I'll see you tomorrow then?" Jake asked Jordan before getting into his car.

"Yeah. I'm taking the morning off, but I'm sure I'll see you in the afternoon." Jordan replied.

"Okay… see you then." Jake said before getting into his car. Jordan waved to him as she headed over to say goodnight to Bug and Lily.

"You getting a ride home with Bug Lily?" Jordan asked, stating the obvious. Lily smiled; she wondered if she should just get a ride home with Jordan. Maybe getting a ride home with Bug would lead to things going to fast. And, she did want to know what happened with Jake. Maybe she should get a ride home with Jordan.

"Actually, maybe I could get a ride with you Jordan." She said, surprising both Jordan and Bug. "Remember that thing I was telling you I needed you help with in my apartment Jordan? I was thinking you could give me a hand with that tonight." She tried to hold back a groan at how lame her excuse was.

"Oh yeah, I remember. Sure." Jordan said with a smile, covering up for Lily, "I'll wait for you in my car." Lily smiled, as to thank her, and Jordan walked away.

"You don't mind, do you Bug?" Lily asked, smiling, looking right into his eyes. She knew he wouldn't disagree.

"No, not at all." Bug said with a smile. Then came the moment Lily had waited for all night. Hesitantly Bug leaned in, Lily doing the same. Their lips touched and neither could remember a time that they were so happy. Jordan looked back over her shoulder to see the two kissing and smiled. Maybe Lily would re-think her decision to ride home with Jordan, but she doubted it. Lily wanted to know what was going on with Jake. She shook her head and got into her car. Finally, Lily pulled away. Bug smiled at her and got into his car. She couldn't believe it. She smiled back and headed to Jordan's car.


	11. Thanks for being a great friend

Lily looked over her shoulder to see Bug pulling out of the parking lot. She took the last few steps and got in Jordan's car. As soon as she sat down, Jordan looked at her with a very big smile.

"I wasn't sure if you were going to change your mind and go home with Bug instead" Jordan laughed, "You two looked like you were enjoying yourselves" Lily swatted her on the arm.

"Yeah, you could tell?" She giggled. She still could not believe what had happened.

"Oh, just slightly" Jordan joked, "Was it at all awkward kissing Bug?" Jordan asked Lily with mock seriousness. But, in a way, she was a bit serious. Bug and Lily had had feelings for each other for quite a while now, but they were close friends, and colleges. It was true that her and Woody had sort of been colleges, but not as directly as Lily and Bug had been. They were also moving at a faster pace than Jordan and Woody ever had. Jordan smiled at the though of kissing Woody like that the first day he had told her he loved her. She didn't know how she would have felt then.

"No" Lily laughed back in response. "Oh Jordan, it's so great to finally be with someone that loves me back, even if it's only been a few hours."

"I'm so happy for you Lily!" Jordan told her friend, as she pulled out of the garage. Then Jordan burst out laughing.

"What?" Lily asked, she had no idea what Jordan was laughing at, but she was pretty sure it was something to do with her.

"Oh, nothing. It's just… Detective Seely! The next time he's in the morgue, he'll start to hit on you the way he always does, only Bug will be more jealous than usual."

"Jordan! That's not a very nice thing to say." Lily told her with a smile and a swat to the arm before she, herself started laughing. There was a time within the last few weeks where she had thought she was in love with Matt Seely, and maybe she had been. But, his conceded attitude was too much for anyone to handle. Even her. There had been times where Seely had shown a side of him that wasn't self centered and obnoxious, but he didn't show it enough. Lily did believe there was a sweet guy in there, but she obviously wasn't in love with him enough to stick around and wait for it to come out. Bug was a sweet guy, all the time. Lily really did love him, and it did feel good to laugh off Seely, she had to admit.

"Speaking of Bug…" Jordan smiled, hinting she wanted to hear about their confessions of love, and the kiss, of course.

"Oh, Jordan, he's amazing! He came into my office all shy and smiley, and I knew something was up. You must have talked to him. He pulled the chair over until it was right beside my chair, and he told me he loved me." Lily said with a faraway smile on her face.

"Wow! Way to go Bug!" She laughed, not expecting her friend to make such an out of character move.

"Yeah. And then he looked straight at me, deep into my eyes, and he kissed me." Lily smiled, remembering the kiss.

"Gee, I wonder what got into him." Jordan laughed, "Then what did you do?"

"Well… I kissed him back, of course." Lily told her, "We kissed for what seemed like forever, and then I realized that Slokum could have walked in at any moment, and what do you think he would have done then?" Jordan shook her head and Lily continued. "I told him I loved him too, and we started talking, about nothing in particular. We were just staring into each others eyes, and talking. He offered to take me to the coffee shop that we ended up going to, and that's when you and Jake walked in. That brings me to my question for you. Jake." Lily told Jordan in about one breath.

"Yeah, I feel bad for interrupting your plans, but that brings me to the answer to your question, which wasn't really a question." Jordan told her, "I was getting ready to go when Jake came to my office. He asked me if I was doing anything, and I didn't have the heart to say no when I looked at him, so I told him that I wasn't, and he asked me if I wanted to go get something to eat. Not wanting to sabotage any chance I had with Woody now, thanks to you," She added giving Lily a grateful smile, "Then I said I thought you two were going out for something, trying to make it seem casual enough. He agreed, reluctantly I may add, and that's when we went to your office. Then, we headed out, and on the street…" Jordan broke off with a small smile, "We were walking down the street and I asked him how Boston was, and he said something like: Oh, it's great, so much fun. And at that same moment, he tried to hold hands with me." Lily half gasped and half laughed, which ended up sounding pretty funny. For any normal person, on a normal dinner acquaintance, it wouldn't have been a big deal. But, this was Jordan, and Jordan was no normal person, and the circumstances with Woody, and her just meeting Jake and him not knowing anything about her past, it made it a bit of a deal. Before asking any more questions, Lily just waited for Jordan to continue. "Then, I pulled my hand away, and told him I sort of had a boyfriend" She said with a laugh. Lily smiled too. It sounded funny for Jordan to refer to Woody as her boyfriend, but she figured it would sound just as funny with her and Bug for a while. "Then, he proceeded to tell he that he had heard things around the office about me and Woody. Apparently, we've been going out for the last four years, and when he was shot we broke up." Jordan said. She knew this shouldn't get to her as it was, but she felt tears coming to her eyes. "How could people think that about me Lily? How can people think that I had been with Woody for four years, four years dammit, and then leave him because he got shot? What kind of person does that?" Jordan asked, tears streaming down her cheeks. Lily patted her friend on the back as she pulled into a parking spot in front of Lily's place.

"Why don't you come up, and we'll talk for a while?" Lily suggested. In the state Jordan was in now, she didn't want her driving. Lily knew it was a paranoid thought, but she had a feeling something would happen to Jordan if she let her drive home by herself from here. So, she had to convince her to come upstairs with her, for a little while anyway.

"No, I'm okay Lily. Really…" Jordan protested, but Lily had a persistent look on her face, so Jordan just got out of the car. "Lily?" She asked as the two started towards the building.

"Yeah Jordan?" Lily replied softly.

"Thanks for being such a great friend." Jordan told her, and Lily smiled.

"You too." She replied, in the same soft voice. By the time Jordan left Lily's apartment, it was the early hours of the morning, but Jordan felt much better. She hugged her friend goodbye, and headed home to get a few hours sleep before going to see Woody at the hospital.


	12. Kisses and Discoverys

Please, please take a second to review my story! It would help me very much in continuing to write. Thanks soo much to the three reviewers I've had! I hope you still like what I'm doing with the story. Sorry if it's a little slow moving, but I'm still deciding what is going to happen next. I've had many crazy thoughts about it, but I'm not sure how extreme I'm going to go. But please let me know what you think, and what you'd want to see happen. I almost have chapter 13 done, it should be up tommorrow!

CHAPTER 12

To Jordan, it seemed like she had just fallen asleep when her alarm clock woke her up. Still very tired, she rolled out of bed and into the shower. Twenty minutes later, she was dressed and having coffee on the couch. She then placed a call to Slokum telling him she was sick and wouldn't be in that morning anyway, but she'd try to make it in the afternoon. It wasn't as if she couldn't take the afternoon off as well. She had accumulated so many days she could take off over the last few years, she could go on one very long vacation, but she never felt the need. If she hadn't already told Lily and Bug what she was doing, they would probably spend the whole day trying desperately to reach her, because when Jordan missed a day of work, they always assumed the worst had happened. She finished her coffee, grabbed her keys and headed out the door.

It was a cool fall day. It would have been beautiful for one of her and Woody's morning runs. She smiled and shook the thought out of her head. No more morning runs for a while. She got into her car, and headed to the hospital. When she got there, Woody had just woken up, and the nurse sent her in. "Hey Woody, how are you feeling this morning?" She asked him with a bright smile. He blinked a few times, remembering yesterday's happy events. Lily coming to see him, then Jordan, and admitting how they felt. It had been an amazing day. He was sure glad to see her.

"Hey. Oh, I'm doing okay… good under the circumstances." He replied with a small smile, "How are you?"

"I'm good." She told him. "You'll never guess what happened last night." She told him, restraining a laugh. He smiled, not knowing what to expect.

"What?" He asked hesitantly. She knew he thought it was going to be something bad, something about her, but she was going to tell him about the hot new couple at the morgue, of course.

"Lily and Bug." She said with a smile.

"Lily and Bug…?" He said, "What about them?" Jordan just continued smiling. "No…" He said with a laugh, "Lily and Bug?" He repeated, with a different sort of meaning.

"Yep." Jordan told him. "Geeze. You should have seen them kiss" She laughed. Woody laughed with her, but at the same time, he wished he wasn't so restrained. It would have been the perfect opportunity for him to do something totally wild, and say something to Jordan like: Was it anything like this? And kiss her. But he couldn't. He was stuck here in this bed, and she was standing at the end of it. If only there was a way… "What's on your mind Woody?" Jordan interrupted his thoughts, "You have a weird look on your face." She told him with a concerned smile.

"Oh… it's nothing." He lied. He considered telling her the truth, that he wanted to kiss her, considering where it had gotten him yesterday, it probably would be the right thing to do… but he didn't know if he could. He should try.

"No… I know it's something…you can tell me, really." She told him, as if to confirm his idea to tell the truth. He took a deep breath.

"Well… it's just, when you were telling me about Bug and Lily, I was just thinking how nice it would be if you and I could be like that… and…" But Jordan didn't let him continue. She knew what he meant, and she walked over until she was standing right beside him, and she kissed him. At first, it was just an innocent peck on the lips, but it was only a few seconds until it turned into more. Finally, they had to pull away. "And that." Woody sort of finished his sentence. Jordan smiled, and backed away until she was sitting on the chair beside the bed. She couldn't believe what she had just done. What had gotten into her? She didn't mind though, and neither did Woody, so everything was okay.

"How was your night last night Bug?" Nigel asked, trying to make some small talk while the two were waiting on some tests. Bug glanced up at him with a smile that Nigel had never really seen Bug show before. "Wow! What was that smile for?" Nigel asked with a laugh. Just then, Lily walked into trace to give them some files on the case. "Hey Lily" Nigel said, assuming Bug was going to wait until later when Nigel had to force what Bug did that was so exciting last night out of him. But, Lily didn't answer Nigel either, instead, her eyes locked into Bug's gaze, and she just stood there staring at him holding the files for a minute. "Am I invisible today or what?" He asked with a bit of sarcasm creeping into his voice. "What is going on with you too?" Nigel waited for a minute, but when neither of his two friend's gazes shifted the slightest bit, he knew something was really up. "Out with it already! What happened last night that was so important you can't tell me?" Nigel demanded.

"Oh, hi Nigel." Lily said, her eyes still not shifting. She seemed to be two minutes behind Nigel in the conversation. "Um… well, last night?" She asked him in a sort of dreamy, faraway voice.

"If I didn't know any better I'd think you to were…" Nigel started, before putting two and two together. "You're not… you aren't…" He stammered. Bug and Lily broke their gaze and looked at him. They nodded and he broke into a smile. "Way to go!" He cheered, "You two are perfect for each other!" "So when did this happen, and how?" He asked, curiously.

"Well, it all started yesterday when I went into Jordan's office." Lily told him, "I told her we needed to talk, and she of course wasn't being helpful about the matter. Then, I asked her to tell me what happened exactly, and she did, which was very surprising, and so not Jordan. I knew she was completely devastated and felt so alone by the way she told me right away, as if she knew she needed help, and telling me would be the easiest thing to do since I had asked. You see, when Woody went into the hospital, Jordan had made it there before they had gotten him into surgery, and she saw him on his way in. Apparently, she told him that she loved him, and she wanted to be with him before he went into surgery. Then, he came out of surgery and they still weren't sure of what was going on with him. That's when Jordan went into see him. He told her that he wanted nothing more to do with her because he knew she was just saying those things because she felt sorry for him."

"That's crazy!" Nigel interrupted her, "Jordan would never just say that. I wish she would have told us earlier!" He was going to continue when Lily shot him a look and continued.

"So, she left. She hadn't gone back to the hospital since that day. She was miserable, we could all tell that, but we weren't sure why, right?" She looked and saw both men nodding in agreement. "Well, that's why. So I told her that I was sure Woody didn't mean it, and that we'd go over to the hospital after work to see him, and we did. I went in to see him first. I heard the nurse tell him that there was a lady here to see him, and when I saw the look on his face when he saw it was me, and not Jordan, I could tell he didn't mean what he had said. I talked to him for a while, and got him to admit that he was still in love with Jordan, and of course, Jordan had been listening the whole time. Then, she walked in, and I left them to talk. And, that's where she is now, at the hospital visiting Woody. So there's the first part of the evening." Lily said with a smile, and a glance at Bug. "Then, on the way back to the morgue, I was driving, and my car broke down in the parking garage. Jordan said she could drive me home, but I said that I had some paperwork to go finish up here. When we were talking, she knew I had ulterior motives for coming back up here to work, and she was right. She got me to tell her that I hoped to see you, Bug, and she said since I had helped her out all night, and fixed her problems, she would help me find out if you liked me back." Lily told the two, blushing. It sounded so child-like when she recounted it. Before she could continue, Bug joined in. "Jordan sure got her chance. Soon after her and Lily had come in, I was sent out to a crime scene, the double homicide we're working on right now. Since Woody is taking a short break from his job, they hired a replacement officer for the time being, Detective Jake Fredrick, and he was on the case with me. Not a bad guy." He said with a smile, "After two hours of hard work on the case, Jake decided to go get us some coffee. That's when Jordan cornered me. Well, I started the conversation actually. I knew Jake liked Jordan. It was obvious by the way he looked at her, and he had asked me if she was seeing anyone when she went to run some tests earlier that evening. So I decided to ask her if she had noticed that he was 'in love' with her, and she said she hadn't, that she had other things on her mind. That's when she asked me how I could tell he was 'in love' with her, and that's when I admitted I was in love with you." Bug said with a small smile. Then Nigel took over.

"And then you all flew off to happy Ville and lived happily ever after until today right?" He laughed at his little joke.

"No, actually the four of us went out for coffee." Bug corrected him. Lily laughed, put the files down, kissed Bug on the cheek and left the room. Bug smiled again as Nigel added,

"You like working with your girlfriend, don't you Bug? So, what about this detective Jake and Jordan, what happened there?" But Bug didn't get time to reply because Jake walked into the room.

"Hey Bug." He said with a nod, and then he turned to Nigel. "Hey, I'm Detective Jake Fredrick, call me Jake."

"I'm Dr. Nigel Townsend, call me what you'd like." Nigel said with little expression before turning back to the computer. He didn't know what it was about this new detective Jake that he didn't like, but it was something. He just got a bad vibe from the guy. Bug shot him a quizzical look before getting back to work.

"So, anything new with the case this morning?" Jake asked, not sensing anything was wrong.

"Not yet." But told him, "But Nigel's working his computer skills trying to get us any leads."

"Yes, with no success so far." Nigel added with a frown. The victims had been found at the end of a back ally in a bad neighborhood. No ID's, and nothing to tell them who they were. It was going to be a tough case to solve. Nigel just wished it wasn't this detective on the case.


	13. They might not be completley wrong

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CHAPTER 13

"So… any clue on when you're getting out of here and into physiotherapy or whatever the next step will be?" Jordan asked after a moment of silence. Woody shook his head. He hadn't said a single thing since their kiss. He was still a bit surprised at what Jordan had done. He didn't mind, of course, it was exactly what he had hoped would happen. But why was everything working out so perfectly right now? He wasn't sure what to say.

"How's Dr. Macy?" He asked finally, but after he did, he didn't know if it was the right thing to say. Jordan's smile disappeared, and a sort of sad, confused look replaced it. Obviously, he was either not doing well at all, or Jordan didn't know how he was doing because he wasn't returning her calls. Either way, he could tell he wasn't back yet, which worried him. He couldn't picture the morgue without Dr. Macy, even though he had sort of experienced it that day just over a week ago when Lily had plastered the VISITOR tag on his jacket. He hadn't liked it at all.

"I wouldn't know." She told him straight out, "He won't return anyone's calls. No one's heard from him since he left." Woody nodded, feeling bad for asking. "It's okay" Jordan reassured him. How could she tell exactly what he was thinking? Was he so emotionally drained that his emotions were that easy to read? He hoped not, but guessed so.

"Sorry." He told her, not knowing what else to say.

"No, really, it's okay." She told him, bringing back her smile. "I can't wait until you meet the guy who's temporarily replacing you on the force." She said with a bit of a laugh, "I don't think you'll like him much."

"Why's that?" He said with a smile, wondering if there was any reason other than the obvious, that he was his replacement for the time being.

"Well, we worked on a case with him last night, Bug and I" She told him. His first thought was why she went back to work last night after the hospital. He thought she would have gone home, but he guessed it wasn't an important part of the story. "I didn't really mind working with him, I mean he wasn't you" She said with a smile, "But he was alright. Then, he went out to grab us some coffee, and Bug and I took a break. That's when things got funny." She told him.

"What do you mean by 'funny'" He asked a concerned look on his face.

"Oh, it's nothing bad Woody." She told him with a laugh, knowing that he'd instinctively be jealous when she told him. "Well, Bug and I were in the break room, and I was planning on asking Bug about Lily, you know, to see if he liked her the way Lily and I hoped he did. But, Bug started a different conversation before I had the chance."

"Let me guess, it was about this Detective Jake?" Woody said with a smile.

"Yeah, how'd you guess?" She said with a laugh. "Bug started innocently enough, but two minutes into the conversation, he was informing me that Jake was 'in love' with me." Jordan looked over at Woody and burst into laughter. The look on his face was priceless.

"In love with you?" He asked, surprised. Sure enough, a wave of jealousy flashed over him. "Well, what happened then?"

"I said I hadn't noticed, because I hadn't, and he said that it was painfully obvious, because it was the same way he looked at Lily. But, of course he didn't say the whole sentence at first; I had to do a little convincing that he could trust me." She told Woody with a smile.

"A little convincing?" He asked with a laugh.

"I just said that she felt the same way, and he should ask her out!" Jordan said defensively. Then we headed back to trace, meeting up with Detective Jake again, and sure enough, he was looking at me the same way Bug looked at Lily which could only mean one thing. Bug was right. Bug had also told me before that Jake had already asked if I was single, and of course, thinking I was still frustrated with you, he had indicated I was. Two hours later, we had given up on the case, leaving it until the morning. Bug headed to Lily's office, and I headed to mine. I was getting ready to leave when Jake came and asked me if I wanted to go get something to eat." Jordan paused for a minute and watched as Woody's jaw tightened. She knew she had made the right decision in interrupting Bug and Lily's plans. "Don't worry Woody" She laughed, "I didn't' go out for something to eat with him… well not alone anyways. We ended up going out with Bug and Lily." Woody put on a cute smile.

"What did you think I was jealous or something?" He said, trying to be serious.

"No! I knew you were!" She laughed. "But anyways, I haven't gotten to the good part yet." Woody rolled his eyes and kept listening. "Bug and Lily said they'd meet us at the new coffee shop down the street in a few minutes, so we headed out. While we were walking down the street very awkwardly, I tried to make some small conversation by asking him how he found Boston. He made some corny reply about it being good, and very 'fun' and proceeded to try and hold my hand." Jordan told Woody. She burst out laughing for the second time in a few minutes after seeing the look of jealousy creep into Woody's face again. "Don't worry Woods, its not like I'd let a guy that close that easily." She told him with a wink, referring to the last four years of their life. He half smiled and waited for her to finish her story. "I pulled away, and told him I sort of had a boyfriend." She said and as she did her cheeks turned pink. Woody noted how cute it made her look. "Then he said something like "I didn't think you'd move on so quickly…" Or something like that, obviously referring to our relationship. We headed into the café, and I made him tell me everything. Apparently, there are people that work with you that have the idea that we've been a couple for the last for years, and we broke up when you got shot. How crazy and embarrassing is that?" Jordan asked him. He smiled. He had gotten the idea that some of his co-workers had thought that, but since no one had really confronted him about it, well except that one time when he had first worked with Santana, he decided to let them think what they wanted.

"That is pretty crazy." He added with a grin, "But they may not be completely wrong now." Jordan smiled too, the pink colour in her cheeks once again darkening.

"Yeah." She agreed with him, "They may have that exactly right." And she leaned in to kiss him once again. After what seemed like forever, the kiss ended.

"Well, as fun as this has been" Jordan said with a wink, "I should get home and ready for an afternoon of work. I wouldn't want to worry Slokum with my absence. I wish to god Garrett would get back in there and fight for his job. I wish to god he'd at least call me… But I'll come by later tonight, maybe bring some more visitors?" Jordan told him with a smile and a soft kiss on the lips.

"Okay." Woody told her. He wanted to add, spending time alone with you is fine though, referring to the kisses they'd just shared, but he didn't want to push things, so he decided to keep it simple. "See you later then." And with a wave, she was gone. What a wonderful morning it had been…


	14. What's up with Slokum?

"Jordan!" Lily called as she saw her friend get off the elevator.

"Hey Lily, what's up?" Jordan asked with a smile.

"Oh, nothing more exciting than last night." Lily told her, "Got a date tonight." Jordan smiled and mentally scratched Bug and Lily off Woody's visitor list.

"Glad to hear it." Jordan replied with a hug. She was so glad to see Lily so happy and excited. "Have you told Nige yet?" She asked with a laugh, thinking of how Nigel would react to the news.

"Yeah, we told him all about last night a little while ago. He was ecstatic." Lily said with a smile.

"So he knows all about Woody and I too?" Jordan asked.

"Yeah, he does. But does anyone other than you and Woody know the whole story?" Lily asked, hinting for Jordan to tell her what had gone on that morning at the hospital. The two made there way to Jordan's office.

"Do I kiss and tell?" Jordan asked with a smug smile. Lily gave her a hug.

"You better!" She told her in a mock threatening voice.

"Okay, okay." Jordan said with a laugh of sarcastic defeat. "I went over to the hospital right after I called in sick for the morning. I started off by telling him about you and Bug. He says congratulations by the way. I told him all about you two and your kissing." Jordan said with a laugh, "And that's the point where we had our first kiss of the day." Jordan told her with a smile, remembering the happy moment.

"First?" Lily asked, "There was more than one?" Jordan nodded, her smile growing, before continuing.

"Then I told him all about exactly what happened last night with you, Bug and Detective Jake."

"He wasn't mad about Detective Jake at all was he? He shouldn't have been… there was nothing to be mad about." Lily said in one long, fast breath.

"No, no. He wasn't mad… a little jealous at first, but jealous looks cute on him" She said with a laugh. "Then after my story is about the time our second kiss occurred. I left soon after that, I need to get back here so I didn't have you all worried about me." Jordan said with a smile.

"Maybe you should have stayed." Lily said, "We would have known everything was alright."

"Are you kidding? Nigel and Bug probably would have started calling my cell phone non-stop after lunch! They would have assumed Woody changed his mind and sent me away, and I got upset and ran. Seriously, I have to keep you informed every step of the way with my history." Jordan said with a smile, but inside she was a little hurt. She knew every word she had said was true, but she had never realized before how little trust her friends had in her.

"Nah." Lily told her, "You would have called me if something went wrong, and if they did, and you had ran, how long you bet it would have been before one of them was at that hospital ready to send Woody back into surgery?" Lily said with a sarcastic laugh. Jordan laughed, her suspicions vanishing. She shouldn't doubt her friends; they were just caring about her.

"So anything new work-wise?" She asked, hoping it had been a slow morning and the answer was no.

"No. Nigel and Bug are still working on that double homicide that came in last night, and there's nothing new besides that yet."

"And how's our favourite chief ME this morning?" Jordan asked her voice dripping with sarcasm as she referred to Jack Slokum.

"Oh, a little stressed you weren't coming in for the morning." Lily told her, "But he'll survive. He's probably looking for me now, so I'd better be on my way…" Lily told Jordan, "But I will talk to you later today, and call you tonight after my date!" She said before heading out the door.

"Bye and okay!" Jordan called after her. She headed to find Slokum, since she had successfully and surprisingly caught up on all her paperwork the day before.

--------------

"So you and Lily, huh?" Sidney teased Bug as soon as he caught wind of the true rumor from Nigel. Bug just nodded and shook his head.

"It's sick how you use Sidney to see me embarrassed." Bug told Nigel as soon as Sidney had left the room. Nigel smiled wickedly and shook his head.

"Oh Buggles, I'm just playing with you." He said with a laugh.

"Please, please don't call me that." Bug pleaded helplessly; knowing him protesting to the unwanted nickname would just make Nigel want to use it more.

"Jordan's here." Lily announced as she stepped into the room for a brief second, smiled at the two and left.

"God I love her." Bug said to no one in particular. Nigel just smiled and continued typing away at his keyboard. Anyone could tell Bug was completely in love with Lily and vise versa. It was about time they did something about it, he didn't want to have to watch another four year Jordan/Woody fiasco. He didn't think the morgue could handle any more relationships like that. He just hoped that everything would work out for the best, because if it didn't things could get very, very awkward. But, for once, Nigel had a good feeling about things, as long as that Detective Jake didn't get in the way. Speaking of which, Nigel had to do some detective work of his own on their new detective friend. Who was Jake Fredrick, and how did he really end up in Boston?

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"Dr. Cavanaugh!" Jordan heard a voice that was getting more familiar, but no less annoying call her name. She spun around to find herself almost face to face with Slokum. "I don't know what illness you had this morning, but I see your feeling better." He told her, and she nodded. What was this about? Was he trying to establish some sort of friendly co-worker relationship? Was he really trying to take Garrett's place in all aspects?

"Glad to hear it." She said, a bit harsher than she had intended. He looked at her for a minute and then spoke again.

"Do you know of any leads on that double homicide case, any idea who the victims are yet?" He asked her.

"Um, no, sorry, I don't. Maybe Nigel or Bug, or someone who's been recently working on the case would." She told him. Why in the world would he be asking her?

"Oh, alright." He replied. "Thanks." And with that, he was off down the hall and into trace to talk to Nigel and Bug. What the hell was that about? Jordan thought. She'd have to ask Lily later. Then she realized Slokum hadn't assigned her any cases yet. Something must have come in… but since she hadn't been assigned anything, she might-as-well see what Lily was up to.

As Jordan set out to find Lily, Slokum entered trace and Nigel and Bug silently groaned. What did he want now? "Dr. Townsend, Dr. Vijay." He greeted them.

"Dr. Slokum." Bug said in response as Nigel sat quietly typing away at the screen.

"What's new with the case?" He asked.

"Nothing yet, as far as we can tell." Nigel informed him, "Although I think I may have a lead on whom the victims are. I'm just researching the possibilities." Slokum looked surprised for a moment.

"Good, well keep up the hard work." He told them before leaving. The two exchanged quizzical looks.

"What was that all about?" Bug asked.

"Keep up the hard work?" Nigel repeated, "You're guess is as good as mine." He told Bug as Jordan entered the room. "Hello love, what's bothering you?" He asked, seeing the look on Jordan's face.

"Well, it's Slokum. He's acting..." Jordan started,

"Strange?" Bug interrupted, "Yeah, we just experienced it."

"Well, something's up. He hasn't been acting weirdly around Lily, I just asked her, and Sidney said that when Slokum discussed the case that Sidney was dealing with, he was less than considerate. It's got to be something about this case…" Jordan said.

"Yeah, and we're going to find out what it is." Nigel chimed in.

"If it's something that's enough to make him civil to us, it must be something pretty big…" Jordan added.

"Which means it could help us get Dr. Macy back here." Bug finished. They smiled and got back to work with much more determination then they had before.

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	15. Garrett

"Where are you Garrett?" Lily whispered to the air in her office. She had just phone his cell phone three times and his home phone twice. No answer on either. Where the hell was he? Why wouldn't he talk to anyone? He must have some reason… he couldn't have run away. He wasn't a hypocrite, she though, but then she remembered why he wasn't here in the first place. It was always "Don't let anything get in the way of doing a thorough job. Their work had to be top notch, and after all those years, all those lectures, he had known he'd done the exact opposite of what he asked them to do. How could he? Had he forgotten about it, or just gritted his teeth every time he went against something he himself had done. She was so caught up in her thoughts that she hadn't heard her cell phone ringing. She stumbled to pick it up before voice mail did. "Hello?" She whispered into the phone.

"Lily. We need to talk. Now." Lily almost dropped the phone out of surprise. It was Garrett.

"Sure Garrett, where and how soon?" Lily told him, grabbing her coat on her way out the door. Fifteen minutes later she was sitting in the same coffee shop she had been the day before, only this time, it wasn't the overwhelming happiness of her relationship with Bug that filled her heart, but worry and excitement about seeing Garrett again. About hearing what he had to say.

"Lily." She heard an all too familiar voice say from behind her.

"Garrett!" She exclaimed, turning around and giving her boss a hug. "What's going on?"

"Its… it's a long story." He said quietly.

"Well, are you going to tell me about it? Because I have a lot of good news to tell you!" She told him with a smile.

"How about you go first." He told her.

"Alright… I hope you're ready for it."

"I thought you said it was good news?" He clarified.

"Yeah, it is. But I'm not sure you know how good I mean by good. Things are almost perfect…" She said with a small smile, her eyes meeting his, "Except your absence, of course." He nodded for her to continue. "Well, it all happened yesterday. Things had changed Garrett since you left, they really had. The morgue, well you wouldn't have recognized it. We came, worked and left. No socializing, no small talk, no after work drinks or visits. We came, worked and left, simple as that. I mean, other than when we were forced into in because of work related situations, such as discussions about medical things in trace, I don't think anyone said a word to Jordan. She changed the most Garrett. Since she ran out of that hospital room a week ago, you wouldn't recognize her. She doesn't put the same effort into cases like she always did and…" Lily could have described the unhappy situation for the next hour, until Garrett interrupted her.

"I thought this was a happy story?"

"Sorry, I just still can't believe how things got to… But yesterday, I decided to put a stop to it. I went into Jordan's office and told her we had to talk. Still having a bit of the real Jordan left inside her, she wasn't going to make it easy, or so I thought. All I asked her was if she could tell me what happened, and the whole story came pouring out. Tears and all." Lily said. Garrett was a little surprised. He knew things would have changed for the worse, and after Lily's description of the morgue, he knew it wasn't pretty, but Jordan breaking down into tears after a simple question? How bad things were things really with her and Woody? What the hell had Woody done to her? "Woody told her to get out of his life." Lily answered his question, reading his thoughts. "She thought he meant it. I think he did to, at the time." Garrett nodded, but he still had an angry look on his face. How could things have gone from this to almost perfect in the duration of one day? This he had to hear. "I told her that I was sure he hadn't meant it, and that we'd go see him after work. Surprisingly, she agreed and after work, we went. I went in first, and you should have seen the look on his face when he found it wasn't Jordan there to see him. He was devastated. I felt so bad for him Garrett, but I knew he'd have his chance in a few minutes. With Jordan listening in, I got him to admit how much he still loved her, and missed her."

"I bet that wasn't too hard." Garrett added with a tad of sarcasm. He of all people knew how much in love Woody was with Jordan. He would have had to get amnesia to lose his love for her in less than a week, and even then, he doubted it would have gone away.

"No, it wasn't" Lily agreed with a nod, "Then, of course, it was like a fairytale. Jordan came in, and I don't think I've ever seen anyone look so happy in my life. I left, and they made up, and she made plans to go back the next morning to visit. All was well."

"Yes, that does sound almost perfect." Garrett agreed, but he thought it would have been more the way Lily described the perfect situation earlier.

"Oh, that's only half the story." Lily smiled, her eyes shining in a way he hadn't seen them for a long time.

"Well continue." Garrett told her.

"Jordan filled me in on the details as I drove her back to her car at the morgue. Just as we pulled into the parking lot, my car broke down. Of course, I could have just gotten a ride home with Jordan and called the night off, but I thought I would head up to the office for some paperwork. Maybe my car braking down was a sign that I should." She said with a laugh. "So, back up I went, but not before Jordan got a little confession out of me first. She came back up to the office too, and you should have seen the look on Slokum face. He didn't know what had happened to the world, us two in the office when we weren't forced for the sake of our jobs. Then, I went to my office to continue some unfinished paperwork from that afternoon, and Jordan was needed in trace. That's where her and Bug met detective Jake Fredrick, Woody's replacement on the force. To make a bit of the longer, unnecessary part of this story long, let's see… how did Bug phrase it… oh yeah, Does being in love with Jordan Cavanaugh come with that job description?" Lily said with a giggle. Garrett broke into a smile too.

"So detective Jake fell in love with Jordan?" He said, chuckling after he had said it out loud. What was with these detectives? They had to pick Jordan, out of all the girls in Boston to fall in love with? Jordan, who was so troubled, and protective of herself. But he couldn't blame them, she was gorgeous, but not in that way, not to him anyway. He viewed her as his daughter and a damn good medical examiner, not as a possible dating opportunity.

"Yep, you could say that." Lily agreed, "Bug informed Jordan on this during a break where Jake had gone out to get some coffee. Jordan also used this little break to the advantage of well, her helping me." Garrett was starting to put the pieces together, but he still wasn't seeing what the puzzle made. "Okay, I'll just tell you plain out Garrett. I am in love with Bug." Garrett smiled. She thought he hadn't already figured that out? He watched these people work every day, all day. He saw how they worked with each other, and how they looked at each other. There wasn't much they could sneak past him without him knowing, even if he pretended not to notice for their own good.

"And…?" He prompted.

"Bug loved me back, that's how Jordan helped me. It ended up all four of us, Jake, Jordan, Bug and I went out for coffee at this shop late last night. Afterwards or sometime during Jordan clarified with Jake that there was no possible chance of hem going out, or having any sort of a relationship beyond the point of friend co-workers. In turn, he told her about how it seems more than a few of his and Woody's colleges viewed Woody and Jordan's relationship."

"I don't understand…" Garrett told her.

"According to some of the Boston PD, or whoever Jake's been talking to, Woody and Jordan have been 'going out' for the last four years, and they broke up when he got shot." Lily said, holding back a laugh.

"Oh really?" Garrett asked with a smile. "What did Jordan say?"

"Nothing to Jake, but later we talked about it and she felt pretty embarrassed." Lily confided. Garrett nodded understandingly. "Is that all of the good news, or is there more?"

"Well, that pretty much sums it up. Oh, other than the fact that this morning, Jordan did go back to visit Woody, and it seems their well on the road to being more than friends, if you know what I mean." Lily added with a smile.

"They kissed?" Garrett asked with a smile of his own.

"Twice, and it wasn't too innocent, or so Jordan told me." She said with a laugh.

"And you and Bug?" He asked, not knowing what to expect the answer to be.

"We're not far behind." She said with a shy grin. He hugged her. He had missed Lily so much. Now that her sharing was over, he knew it would be time for him to talk. If there was anyone he could try and explain things to, it was Lily. Jordan, well she'd understand, but she'd be too mad at him for the first few days he started talking to her again to be able to listen. He needed someone more rational. Lily was the right person. He just hoped it wouldn't put her in too much of an awkward position.

---------------

"Has anyone seen Miss. Lebowski?" Slokum asked, seemingly annoyed as he burs into trace.

"Sorry." Bug told him.

"Ah, I thought you would have had her under high security Buggles." Nigel teased quietly, hoping Slokum had heard, but hadn't caught what he said. He didn't know about Slokum, but Jordan had heard and was trying to fight back her laughter. She knew how much Bug hated being called Buggles, and Nigel was going to constantly tease him about Lily until Bug found something to keep him quiet with, in which case she could tease them both. Ah, she loved the way things worked.

"I'm going to ignore whatever you meant by that comment, Dr. Townsend." Slokum told Nigel, which meant he hadn't heard. "So how is this case coming?" Slokum asked in a way too innocent voice.

"Oh, just fine." Jordan told him with a smile.

"Well, I trust it should be coming along more than fine, with three of our best devoting all their time to it." He added slyly, hinting for one of them to take another case, but they weren't backing down.

"Oh, we'll crack it in no time Dr. Slokum." Nigel said, mocking Slokum's innocent voice.

"You better." Slokum shot back, but with a little uncertainty which confirmed the assumption that Slokum had something to hide, and this case was the link to it. Now they just had to find out what that link was…


	16. Your turn to share

I'm still stalling a bit to figure out exactly where this is all going to end up. I've got vauge ideas, but I'm still developing them. I am just wondering what you guys think about this: are you liking the relationships right now (Lily/Bug and Jordan/Woody) and if anyone has any suggestions on whether they should all be happy and stay together or split up just let me now! I would really appreciate some more reviews, and thanks to the three of you that gave me some!

"Okay Garrett. You're turn to share." Lily told him. He still didn't know what to say. Dammit! How could he do this to her?

"I… I don't really know how to tell you this Lily." He told her, not meeting her eyes. He couldn't.

"Just tell me Garrett. I can handle it. Tell me the truth." Lily told him, squeezing his hand. He shouldn't have called her. It was all a mistake. But, it was too late; he'd have to tell her something. She'd know if he was lying. She knew him so well, damn it. Why had he chosen to tell her?

"If you're sure." He started, closing his eyes for a moment. He re-opened them and decided to go with the truth. It would make things less complicated in the long run, he guessed. It seemed like honesty was having its rewards around the morgue lately anyways, he might as well try his luck. "Well, Lily, I'm just going to tell you this straight out. There's a reason I haven't been talking to anyone this past week, I wanted to. Oh god, I can't tell you how much I wanted to talk to someone, anyone. You, Jordan, Nigel, Woody, anybody, but you see, I couldn't."

"But why Garrett?" Lily asked, confused.

"That's the part I don't know how to say." He told her, "You see… I met someone." Lily smiled, not understanding what he met, well how could she? He'd been so unclear, and made it sound as if he'd ended up in a relationship like Woody or Jordan's or her and Bug's.

"It's not like that Lily, really." He told her, and she nodded. "Really, it's not that kind of meeting. I met this person about a week before Slokum came into the office."

"Who is it Garrett, and what does it have to do with Slokum?" She asked, even more confused than before.

"I can't tell you who it is, and it has everything to do with Slokum, and a double homicide that should be in trace by now." He told Lily. She didn't know what to say.

"Yeah, it came in last night. It's the one detective Jake came in with…" She told him, still very much confused.

"Oh god. I should have guessed that."

"Guessed what Garrett? What are you talking about, please tell me."

"Lily, if I tell you, you'll have to leave the morgue for now too. You'll have to stop talking to everyone, the same way I did. You can't do that. I can't tell you everything. I'll tell you as much as I can… and then you have to go back and tell Bug, Nigel and Jordan." He instructed her.

"Okay, I will. Just tell me everything you can." She told him, and he sighed. This was going to be one long conversation…

"No one could convince me something's not up with that guy now." Bug said as soon as Slokum left.

"No one's going to try." Jordan told him with a smile. "We just have to solve this, and link him to it in the process. Find out what this is all about and get things back to how they used to be."

"You know love," Nigel told her, "Things may never be how they used to be… Garrett's still the same Garrett, but can we really look at him the same knowing that he hid this from us all those years, all those years knowing he had done exactly what he told us never to do?"

"I don't know." Bug said, "But we can try." Jordan nodded in agreement, and Nigel shrugged his shoulders.

"Whatever you two say."

--------------

"Hello Detective Hoyt." A nurse greeted him as she brought him his lunch, "You're looking especially happy today." Woody nodded. He couldn't get rid of the smile he had today if he tried. Things were great. He was going to get better, he was, and his physiotherapy would start soon, and he'd be up and about again, and then there was the little fact that Jordan had kissed him.

"Yeah. I'm feeling great."

"Was it because your girlfriend came to see you?" She asked with a laugh and a wink. As he started to tell her that Jordan wasn't his girlfriend, he stopped.

"Yeah, that had a lot to do with it." He answered with a laugh. Jordan had referred to him as her boyfriend last night, so it was fair he did the same. He couldn't wait to see her again tonight. It would be nice to see Nigel, Bug, Lily and some of his other friends again, but spending time alone with her was quite fine too.

"Well, I'm glad she came back. It must have been such a shock to her. It took her almost a week to come back."

"Yeah." Woody agreed, a little uncomfortable, because he knew it was his fault that she hadn't returned.

"Okay, well you seem to be doing quite fine, so take these pills and I'll come back in a little while." She told him, placing a few pills on the tray and heading out the door. He nodded and took them. Although he hated it, he wanted to get out. Back to Jordan and everyone else at the morgue, and so that this Jake guy could leave as soon as possible. He didn't like him around Jordan, especially since he had fallen in love with her as quickly as Woody had. He knew it wouldn't be a problem though. It had taken Jordan four years to finally admit she was in love with him too, and she had, so it wasn't as if she was going to go running off with some guy she had met yesterday, especially after she told Jake that he was her boyfriend. Every time he though about Jordan saying that, he couldn't think of anything else. Just her. Her smile, her personality, her beauty, and most of all, especially since this morning, her kiss.

---------------

"Good afternoon!" Jake exclaimed as he walked into trace.

"Detective Jake." Bug said with a nod, and Jordan just looked up and smiled hello.

"Anything new?" Jake asked.

"We've got what we think could be a lead to who the victims are, but we're still checking it out, but other than that absolutely nothing." Jordan told him. He nodded and walked over to where Nigel was madly typing on his computer.

"What are you doing there?" He asked. Nigel looked up with a frown on his face.

"Nothing, just a little research on the possible victims." He told Jake. Jordan and Bug could tell that Nigel didn't like Jake, and that he didn't want him to stand there and watch him work, but Jake didn't get the hint.

"Wow! That's so cool!" Jake exclaimed at something Nigel was doing on the computer. Nigel shrugged and Bug and Jordan exchanged looks of surprise. Why didn't Nigel like Detective Jake? It was obvious he didn't. Nigel turning down the chance to tell and brag about whatever he was doing on the computer? It was a first! He was usually bragging and explaining when people didn't want to know, and got so excited when people asked. What had gotten into Nigel?


	17. Are you kidding?

Sorry for the little wait, I was having trouble finding time to write it all, and I had some good stuff written at the beginning of the chapter, and then of course, the power went off, and my computer is so out of space the good old backup filing didn't kick in… but that's okay. Tell me what you think, please! And thank you a LOT to everyone who has reviewed!

CHAPTER 17

Twenty minutes later Jake rushed out of trace after a call from the chief. As soon as he was down the hall and had no chance of hearing their discussion, Bug and Jordan started their interrogation. "Nigel…" Bug started.

"What was that about?" Jordan interrupted him. Nigel looked up slowly. He was expecting this conversation, but he hadn't anticipated it to be right this second, and you could never prepare yourself for what you faced when Jordan was angry with you, or just confused by your actions. "Seriously Nigel, what's your problem with Jake? He's an okay guy, and you don't have to right to treat him like that. He's just trying to fit in and get a feel for his new job in a new city and he needs some friends." Jordan yelled at him after waiting and receiving no reply from Nigel after the first question.

"Okay. He just gave me a bad feeling… and I checked him out…"

"What did you find Nigel?" Bug asked, cutting straight to the point. Nigel wasn't sure what to say. He had found many things, but he wasn't quite sure where to start explaining.

"Nigel?" Jordan prompted, "What the hell did you find?" Nigel just looked at her, and then at Bug.

"I don't know where to being." He stated, trying to keep his voice as calm as possible. Bug shook his head.

"Is it good, bad, irrelevant?" He asked, sensing Nigel's uncomfortable feeling and trying to make it a little easier on him. He and Jordan were basically double teaming him on the topic and having Jordan question you like that was enough on its own, he knew that.

"Mostly bad." Nigel told them, trying to hide his smile. He knew that when he found some more information, he would be able to prove himself right. Jordan's face softened a bit when she found that she may be wrong about Jake.

"Oh… well what exactly have you found?" She questioned him.

"Well… I'm not really sure. I did simple background searches on him education and background, and well, it looked alright at first, but after a little digging, I found out he's not the good guy we all thought we were getting to know."

---------

"Okay, this is a bit clearer now, but let me recap." Lily told Garrett, "So, Slokum is working with two guys, one of which you think to be Detective Jake, and they're killing people?" It sounded too crazy, and random. Why? It made no sense. Why would they want to kill people when they all had fair paying jobs, probably families…?

"Yeah. Well, they aren't just killing randomly. They're protecting something… some sort of secret, or maybe someone. I haven't figured it out yet anyway. The double homicide, Slokum arranged it, I'm sure, and Detective Jake must have something to do with it since he just joined the police force and was on the case. We have to find out who the first detective on the scene was… we need to get Jordan, Bug and Nigel involved. We have to tell them everything we know. If I tell them they will, well Jordan at least, just want to yell at me for an hour about why I left and haven't tried to come back yet, and we don't have time for that. You have to tell them Lily. We have to figure this out, and fast."

"I will Garrett, but why haven't you tried to come back, and how do you know all of this anyway?" Lily asked with a small smile, squeezing Garrett's hand once again. She was glad he had come to her with this information. It meant so much to her that he trusted her. Once they all figured this mess out, and Garrett was back things would be great!

"Well, I haven't tried to come back yet because of how I know all of this. There is one more person who is in on all of this that I know of. There is Slokum, Detective Jake I'm assuming, another police officer and a woman. I met her at a bar, and she had too much to drink, and started talking about Jack Slokum, and of course, I was all ears. She seemed glad to have someone to talk to, although Slokum seemed to have her quite scared. I took her home, and then drove to my place, thinking everything over. It all fit too well, Slokum finding all the things about me and the old case, me meeting the woman, losing my job, Slokum getting my job. It's all too ironic. We have to be careful, or someone, one of us, is going to get hurt. Maybe killed. We can't let that happen. Never, ever discuss any of this at the morgue, or anywhere near the morgue. Once Woody's out of the hospital which I'm guessing should be in a week or two if all's coming as well as I've heard, tell him too. He'll want to help, of course." Lily nodded in agreement. "Maybe even go to someone's apartment and talk about it. I wouldn't risk mentioning it anywhere, and to anyone other than Jordan, Nigel, Bug and Woody."

"I know, I know. I get it Garrett." Lily told him. She was really glad to see him, and he looked well, but he was sort of nervous, and a bit jumpy. She wasn't sure if she actually knew how dangerous this situation could be.

"Okay. I know, I'm sorry, it's just… I can't imagine what I'd do if you… anyone got hurt." He told her. They paid and got up. Lily pulled Garrett into a hug.

"I've missed you so much!" She told him with a smile. He held her tight, and nodded. He had missed her, and everyone at the morgue, more than he ever thought he would. Being away really made him realize how much he loved them all. He couldn't wait until this whole ordeal was over, and he was back with them… It would be soon… at least he hoped it would.

----------

"But what exactly did you find?" Bug asked. Why did Nigel not want to tell them whatever he knew? It made no sense, it seemed as if he had been right, and they had been wrong, and that there was something bad about Jake that he and Jordan didn't know, but why wouldn't he tell them.

"Nige, please. I'm begging you, just tell us." Jordan pleaded. She wondered what could be so bad that Nigel didn't want to tell her and Bug.

"I will… but I shouldn't here. It's too risky. I'll tell you later, when we're not in the morgue, alright?" He more or less told them. They sort of nodded, confused, and got back to work. A few minutes later, with no leads on anything, and still no IDs on the victims, they decided they had to take a break.

"I've heard you're busy tonight Bug." Jordan said with a smile as they headed toward the break room.

"Busy? Do you have a date Buggles?" Nigel joined in, more than happy to let Bug be the center of attention for a while.

"Yes, I have a date." Bug said trying to keep from smiling. Jordan loved seeing him and Lily so happy. She couldn't believe that they were actually going out, but they were, and they were happy, so she was glad. And, it wasn't like she wasn't happy herself anyways. She couldn't wait to see Woody again!

"Do you have a date tonight too Nigel?" Jordan joked. Nigel glanced over at her.

"Are you kidding?" He laughed.

"Well, would you be interested in joining me to visit Woody at the hospital?"

"Wouldn't I be intruding on your date with Woodrow then?" He asked with a cocked eyebrow and a mischievous smile. Jordan returned the look.

"No you would not. He hasn't talked to anyone other than Lily and I for the past week Nige, come on, please come?" Jordan begged. He almost burst out laughing at the sight. Bug just shook his head and sat down, watching how the little scene played out. They all knew that Nigel would go; everything around here just had to be so dramatic. But, as long as Jordan and Nigel were going to leave him alone for the moment, he let his thoughts drift to Lily, and their date that night. He wasn't sure where they were going yet, Lily had mentioned a few places, but he had been too caught up in her eyes to remember exactly what she had said. That seemed to be the way it was when he was with her. He forgot about everything else in the world. Work, his cases, his problems, anything that was on his mind just vanished. The only existence he could acknowledge was her. Her eyes, her smile, her hair, everything about her. The way she smelled, the way she laughed… She was the most amazing woman he had ever met, but it wasn't like he hadn't known that for a long time. It seemed like he had been in love with her forever, and he knew he always would be. The only thing he resented was the resemblance that was starting to form between his and Lily's and Jordan and Woody's relationships. Both couples worked together, both him and Woody had fallen for the girl practically the moment they laid eyes on her and had gotten more and more crazy for her ever since. Both had taken forever to pass the 'friends' stage, but he hoped, and sort of knew, that he and Lily wouldn't linger at the friends and past friends borderline very long. The kisses they had shared yesterday had told him that, the way they looked at each other had told him that too. He didn't think Lily was quite as complicated as Jordan was either, which he had to admit was a bit of an advantage. Jordan was one of his best friends, but he couldn't imagine trying to get her to like him… well in a way, he could, since he had heard a million times about the process it took from Woody and Jordan. He didn't even want to think about that right now. He let his mind drift back to Lily, and he imagined their date that night. He hoped everything would work out alright in the end…

"Bug!" Jordan was almost yelling now. Nigel walked across the room and gave Bug a not so soft punch in the arm.

"Hey! What was that for?" Bug asked defensively shaking his head, and holding his arm.

"Sorry!" Nigel told him with a laugh, "We needed you back on earth with us Buggles! You were daydreaming… again…"

"Oh, come on you two!" Jordan said, pushing them out of the room with a laugh. Slokum shook his head. He had been watching through the window. They didn't know anything yet. They would have talked about it, or at least acted less playful, like they had all the time in the world. He was surprised Jordan hadn't commented on his lack of disciplinary action for their longer and more often than necessary breaks, but he couldn't be happier. They could only work on a case for so long, and the less time they took on it, the better. He knew they would never figure it out… but if he was so sure about it, why was he watching over them like this, and why was he so paranoid?


	18. Brothers and Fiancees

CHAPTER 18

A/N: Yes, it's been forever, I've been pretty sick (blood tests and lots of pills and fun stuff) and in Barrie, and away from a computer, and school, homework – it's been crazy! I figure I should add a disclaimer, ha but I suck at this kind of stuff. So just so we're clear, I do not own Crossing Jordan or anything to do with it, only Jake Fredrick and the ideas.

Garrett didn't know where to go. He drove around for what seemed like forever. He'd spent more than enough time in his apartment, he wouldn't dare go anywhere near the morgue and everyone was at work so he couldn't visit anyone even if he wanted to. Then he thought of someone who wasn't at work- Woody. He turned around and headed towards the hospital. When he got there, he walked into Woody's room to find him staring at the wall, a smile on his face. "Hey." He said quietly. Woody turned to look at him as he shut the door.

"Oh, hey Dr. Macy!" He answered enthusiastically, especially for someone in a hospital. "Haven't seen you in a while, what brings you by?" Woody could tell that Garrett was genuinely surprised at his positive attitude.

"Well, just thought I'd stop by and say hello…" Garrett told him.

"Don't have much else to do?" Woody asked with a smile, Garrett sort of shrugged, a bit embarrassed, "Its okay, really."

"I'm guessing the good mood is because of Jordan?" Garrett said with a small laugh. Woody nodded.

"Who's been spreading the good news?" He asked.

"Lily." Garrett answered, "She's the only one I've talked to since I left. Can you imagine what Jordan's going to say to me?" Woody chuckled at the thought, shaking his head.

"I see your point there." He agreed. "So, what do you think about Bug and Lily?" Woody asked starting a new conversation.

"I don't know." Garrett said rubbing his temples. Woody looked at Garrett for a moment, remembering that there had been a time when he and Lily had gone out. He thought about how awkward it had felt to picture Jordan going out with someone else even after he had broken it off with her… but that was before she came back and made his life perfect.

"You still aren't in love with her, are you Dr. M?" He asked quietly, hoping he wasn't. He knew how happy he and Jordan were, and he figured that Bug and Lily had the same feeling… he didn't want anything to take that away. Enough things had gotten in his and Jordan's way, Bug and Lily didn't need that too.

"No." Garrett replied quickly and quietly. He hoped it hadn't sounded as unsure as he was. He didn't think he was still in love with Lily. It had been so long ago… they had been just friends forever, but she had never really moved on in a way. This was the first time, well the first time he'd heard about, that she'd been with someone else.

"You sure?" Woody questioned him.

"No."

"You don't know?" Woody said with a small smile. "I know how you feel. You two haven't been together for some time, but Lily never moved on to anyone else did she? It was almost as if she'd always be there if you needed her… and then one day, today, she's not. She'll always be there as a friend, but now you know for certain she's not in love with you."

"Is that what I'm feeling?" Garrett asked with an uncertain laugh.

"Yeah, probably. But, you have to be happy for her, just as I would have had to been happy for Jordan if she would have moved on." Garrett thought for a moment about what Woody had said. He couldn't imagine Jordan moving on and Woody accepting it, but if anyone knew about frustrated feelings towards love it would have to be Woody. Jordan had kept him dangling for four years… and he had waited patiently.

"I guess you're right." Garrett agreed, dismissing the topic. He didn't want to think about it anymore. He knew Woody was right; Lily would always be there for him as a close friend. He knew Bug loved her, and had for some time now. He wanted them to be happy.

"So." Woody said, hinting there was nothing to talk about.

"So…" Garrett repeated. Garrett considered taking this silent chance to tell Woody what he had told Lily, but he figured it was best not to in the hospital where Woody would want to do something about it right away, but couldn't. He didn't want to put a damper of his friend's happy mood, so decided it wasn't the right time. Jordan, Lily and the rest of them could decide when to tell Woody once they knew what was going on.

"What's on your mind Garrett?" Woody asked in a concerned voice as he noticed the perplexed look on the older man's face.

"Oh, just thinking about how much I miss my job and all." Garrett told him. It sounded like a believable answer to him, and to Woody it appeared.

"Yeah… me too." Woody nodded. Garrett almost forgot that Woody wouldn't be back in his old spot for quite a while. They were in the same boat, but for different reasons. He didn't know whose would make him feel worse. Probably Woody's. It was his own fault he didn't have a job right then. He didn't have to listen to his boss all those years ago… things could have worked out differently… but Woody, he was just doing his job and some stupid kid decided he had to take one more person's life, thank god he hadn't succeeded.

"When do you get out of here anyway?" Garrett asked with a smile.

"Uh, next Monday." Woody answered with a smile. Only six more days to kill, then he would be home. No quite good as new, not quite ready to do exactly what he wanted, but he would be at his apartment. He couldn't wait.

"Great." Garrett told him, his smile widening a bit. Woody knew there was something more going on with Garrett than he was letting on… but what could it be he wasn't telling him?

-----

"So what were you daydreaming about?" Jordan teased as they headed back towards trace. Nigel poked him in the ribs, and Bug rolled his eyes.

"What do you think?" He asked with a shake of his head.

"Ooo…" Nigel whispered with a smile.

"No!" Bug yelled, "Not that!" He said a bit quieter this time, giving Nigel a shove. "I was just thinking about our date tonight."

"We know Bug, don't get all defensive!" Jordan teased.

"Yeah Bug, what did you think we meant?" Nigel asked with another poke to his ribs.

"Ah, just drop it would you?" Bug told him, hitting his hand away. "So how'd those tests turn out Nige?" Bug asked once they had settled down in trace. He hoped they'd found ID's on the victims so they could at least push forward a bit with this case. It bothered him how long it was taking, especially when it could get Dr. Macy back and Slokum gone.

"Well let me check." Nigel told him, pressing a few keys on the keyboard. Jordan walked over and stood beside him, tapping her foot impatiently. Slokum shook his head. What was it with these people? It was as if they were all best friends doing a school project they way they joked and fooled around. What kind of circus was Dr. Macy running here? But, unfortunately for Jack Slokum, the voice in his head (the one he never listened to), told him: The kind where everyone likes each other and gets along. The kind where everyone likes each other but gets the work done too. The kind you could never run because of your lack of people skills and… Slokum shook his head and headed off to find Lily as Jordan wandered out of trace. What was she up to now?

Lily didn't know how to feel as she drove back to the morgue. On top of her happiness over her and Bug's relationship, she wasn't sure whether to be happier because she had seen and talked to Garrett, or to be upset and worried over what he had told her. Then, a few blocks away from the morgue, she saw Jake Fredrick with another guy and a woman. That could be the woman Garrett met and the other man Slokum's working with, she thought. She turned down the next street, deciding to do a bit of detective work herself. She knew she shouldn't, thinking of all the horrible situations Jordan had gotten herself into over the years… but she couldn't help it. She finally knew how Jordan felt, wanting, no, needing to figure out exactly what was up… only this time she wasn't directly pursing a case she was working on… but that wasn't really fair to say since she never really had a case she was working on in that sense, being a grief councilor and all. She parked her car on the corner opposite to where Jake and his accomplices were standing. Unfortunately, she sucked at the detective thing, and a minute later, Jake was waving her over to join them. She got out of her car, grabbing her purse. She was a bit nervous… what if they knew she'd been spying? What if they killed her too? "Hey Lily!" Jake said a big smile on his face. He went halfway across the street to meet her.

"Hey Jake." She smiled. He put his hand on her back and led her over to where the man and women were standing. She was a bit taken aback by his action, since she had just met him yesterday, and she knew he was fully aware of her and Bug's relationship.

"This is Lily Lebowski." Jake introduced her as if he talked about her all the time and they were finally getting to meet her. She smiled and shook hands with the man and smiled at the woman.

"I'm Lawrence, this is my fiancée Maryann." He told her with a grin.

"Hi." She said awkwardly. She barley knew Jake and he was introducing her to his friends? She was very confused, and she sensed that Jake was getting the feeling.

"Can I just talk to you for a sec Jake?" She asked.

"Excuse us…" Jake said politely to Lawrence and Maryann who nodded and started a conversation of their own. "What's up?"

"Um… sorry, I was just wondering… who are these people and why are you introducing me like you know me so well when I just met you yesterday?" Jake's smile faded a bit… and a pathetic, pleading look took its place. It gave Lily an unsure feeling like he wanted a favour…

"Lawrence was my best friend all through high school and university… he's a cop too. Maryann, well I'm not exactly sure of her profession, I just met her a few days ago myself. It's just… Lawrence and I… we were always really competitive. You know the kind of friend right?" Jake asked hopefully. Lily sort of nodded and he continued.

"Well… he's been holding it over my head since I've been in Boston that he has a fiancée and I don't…"

"You didn't!" He gave her an even more pathetic smile. "Jake! I am with Bug! I would have been happy to go along with it three days ago when I wasn't seeing anyone… and if you were one of my closer friends I would do it for you… but I just met you yesterday, and I'm in a relationship!" She protested.

"Pleaseeee Lily?" He pleaded. She was surprised he wasn't begging on his knees yet. Why her? Why not Jordan? Was he really that good of a detective that he had picked up from the one coffee conversation yesterday that if either she or Jordan were going to do this, he'd have the best chance with her? She shook the crazy thoughts out of her head. She wasn't going to pretend to be this man's fiancée. He could be helping Slokum keep Garrett out of his job, for god sakes! Then again… it could help them in the long run if she won over his trust… her thoughts were interrupted by her cell phone ringing.

"One sec." She told him, stepping away. "Hello?" She said into the phone.

"Hey!" Came Bug's reply. Jake saw her face light up and her smile widen. He knew it was Bug on the phone.

"What's up?"

"Nothing, where are you? Slokum's going crazy trying to find you."

"Ooo, be jealous." Lily joked. "Well… it's a bit of a long story which I will tell you in detail tonight, but right now I'm about two blocks away from the morgue talking to detective Jake, his best friend from high school and his best friend's fiancée."

"Okay?" Bug laughed. "Can I ask why?"

"I'm not sure… well it's just part of the story… don't worry about me… but there's something I've got to ask you, but don't worry okay?"

"What is it?"

"This is going to sound weird. Jake wants me to pretend to be his fiancée while his friend and his fiancée are in town." Lily expected the easy going Bug she knew to just laugh it off… but he didn't say anything at all. He was worried about her. Nigel knew things that weren't reassuring about Jake Fredrick, and now he wanted Lily to be his fiancée?

"Just sec…" He told her. "Hey Nige…" He hissed quietly, covering the receiver. "What Buggles?" Nigel laughed. Bug motioned for him to be quiet, pointing to the phone.

"It's Lily… is there any reason that she shouldn't pretend to be Jake's fiancée?" Bug whispered.

"Other than the fact she's your girlfriend…"

"No, I mean… from what you've found, I don't mind, it's just until his friend leaves town."

"Actually, it could be quite beneficial." Nigel told him. Bug just shrugged, very confused.

"Lily?"

"I'm sorry Bug… it's alright, you don't even have to think about it. I shouldn't have asked…"

"No, no. It's fine, go ahead. But be back soon okay?"

"Alright, I will. Love you!" She said with a smile.

"Love you too." Jake walked back over to her as he saw her shut her phone.

"What did Bug say?" He asked with a hopeful glimmer in his eyes. Lily wondered why he was pretending with his 'best friend'. Why not just say that she was at work, or out of town on business? It was all confusing to Lily… she just hoped she wasn't cooperating her way into some major scheme that was going to get her or someone she loved killed.

"I guess we're getting married." She said with a wink, as they headed back over to Lawrence and Maryann hand in hand.

"So Bug, I heard your girlfriend's getting married to another guy." Jordan laughed as she entered the room.

"Why does everyone keep referring to Lily as my girlfriend? She's still Lily you know. Am I going to be known as her boyfriend all the time too?"

"Oh quit dodging it, mate." Nigel said with a grin. "Why is Lily pretending to be Jake's fiancée?" Bug shook his head.

"Because he asked her to. It's a long story and she's telling me tonight." Nigel and Jordan both just shook their heads and continued working.

"Eureka!" Nigel shouted, making Bug jump out of his chair.

"What?" Bug questioned him, walking over to look at the computer screen Nigel was pointing at.

"Say hello to victim number one, Joey Macdonald."

"Is that all you got?" Jordan asked with a doubtful smile.

"By the way, good job Nige." Nigel said putting on his best 'you hurt my feelings' face. "No, it's not all I've got. Looks like our Mr. Macdonald has an _exemplary_ record since 1989."

"1989? What about the last 16 years?" Bug pointed out.

"I'm getting to that Bug, just cool your jets and listen, would you?" Nigel answered impatiently. "It seems before a legal name change in 1989, our victim was known as Robert Slokum?" Nigel read, his voice becoming questioning when they heard the last name.

"I'm betting that's not a coincidence." Jordan said in a grim voice. "Do you think that's why Slokum's been so antsy about this case? Because he knew it was his brother and had something to do with it?"

"I don't know… but I hope Lily gets back soon… I want tomeet Dr. Slokum's mom!" Nigel said with a laugh. Bug smiled.

"Are you sure? I mean only half of his genes are her… let's just hope his father was the obsessive compulsive control freak then."

"You got that right." Jordan said with a nod. They continued to work on getting an ID on the second victim with new hope. Slokum was going down…

A/N: Yeah, I have no clue how it affects files on databases and that when you get a legal name change… I'm just sort of making things up about it. Not talented in that field… ha.

Please review… I'm not sure how it's going and thanks to everyone that is reviewing!


	19. Anticipation

CHAPTER 19

"Sorry about that." Jake said to Maryann and Lawrence as he and Lily came back towards the group.

"Oh, that's fine." Lawrence smiled. Lily smiled too, realizing how awkward this situation was for Jake. Yes, it was awkward for her too, but Jake, he'd have to pretend he and Lily broke up, and put on a big show next time Lawrence came to Boston… Lily would never have to see them again.

"So, have you two set the big date yet?" Maryann asked.

"Um, no." Jake replied, "We're still thinking about it."

"Oh." Maryann replied with a bit of a smirk in Lawrence's direction. Lily wondered if they knew Jake and her were faking it.

"He wants a fall wedding… I like the spring." Lily told her with a smirk of her own.

"I see." Lawrence said, raising his eyebrows in an 'I told you so' way towards Maryann. Lily smiled; she definitely knew what Jake meant when he said Lawrence was the competitive type. Betting your fiancée on if your best friend's engagement was false or not?

"Yep." Jake said with a nod.

"Well, I have to get back to the morgue… you coming?" Lily asked Jake.

"The morgue?" Maryann asked disgustedly.

"Yeah, I'm a grief councilor there." Lily said with a nod, taking Jake's hand and leading him away from the other 'couple', "Nice meeting you!" She called over her shoulder. "I know what you mean about your friend being competitive." She whispered to Jake after they had started to cross the street.

"Tell me about it." He answered with a smile. He waved to Lawrence and Maryann once more.

"Where's your car?" Lily asked him.

"Car? I jogged here." He told her, motioning to his loose clothing.

"Oh, care for a ride?" She asked with a laugh.

"Sure… that way we won't have to kiss goodbye." He said.

"Yeah… kissing you would make things way awkward." She told him with a smile.

"Tell me about it. Bug would bite my head off." He said with a laugh. They both shook their heads and got in Lily's car.

"Where is Lily?" Slokum demanded bursting into trace for what seemed to be the millionth time that day.

"We do not know." Bug told him, "When she gets here… we will be _sure_ to tell her you've been looking for her, alright?"

"Fine. How's the case?"

"Fine." Nigel returned with a smirk. Slokum shook his head and left the room as quickly as he had entered.

"Where _is _Lily?" Jordan repeated after Slokum had left. Nigel shrugged his shoulders.

"Somewhere with Jake. Maybe they got married" He said with a laugh poking Bug once again.

"They did not get married." Bug told his two friends, obviously getting annoyed at their continuous teasing.

"Fine, fine." Jordan laughed in defeat. It really wasn't like Lily though… leaving work and not coming back for a few hours. Jordan? Yes. Lily? No. They'd just put all of their energy into getting their second victim ID'd and hoped Lily would come back soon… they really, _really _wanted to see Slokum's family!

"Do you need to go to the morgue? Or where?" Lily asked Jake as she realized that she was pulling into the morgue, and wasn't sure if he was going there or not.

"Morgue's great." He told her with a smile. It almost reminded her of the time when her and Seely had pretended to be husband and wife, and looking for someone to take care of Lily's sick mother… the memory was a funny one, but she didn't want to think about Seely anymore… she wanted to think about _only _Bug, and Jake was making that hard enough for her… pretending to be his fiancée and all. She pulled into a parking spot and they both got out of the car and headed up to the morgue. Then a thought hit Lily that she hadn't considered before. She had left the morgue before lunch time, not telling Slokum, or anyone for that matter, where she was going and when she'd be back. It was well into the afternoon now… Slokum would be pretty mad, Jordan and Nigel annoyed, and Bug of course, would be Bug.

"See you later!" Jake called to her as they entered the morgue and headed in their separate directions.

"LILY!" Slokum and Jordan called, almost in unison. She didn't know whether to be scared, confused or what. Slokum got to her first.

"Lily, where have you been? You are aware that I am running a smoothly operated office here. Unexplained absences for any reason are unacceptable…" She was forcing a smile, nodding in agreement to what he was saying, trying to make things go as easily as they could for her. She glanced over at Jordan to see her waiting very impatiently for her turn to talk to Lily. What did she have to say that couldn't wait until Slokum's little rampage was done?

"Slokum, do you have anything important to say? Or may I talk to Lily about business related matters now?" Jordan interrupted him.

"Excuse me Dr. Cavanaugh?" Slokum started in on Jordan, "This _is _important…" But Jordan just cut him off once again.

"No, it's not." She argued. "It's just you trying to make yourself feel more in charge or dignified or something by laying down the law and getting people in trouble. Well, guess what? Trying to be all 'in charge' doesn't make us like you and by reprimanding us for _every_ little thing we do wrong in front of people, it doesn't make you have any more power." Jordan practically yelled before literally grabbing Lily by the arm and dragging her into trace. When she pushed the double doors open, she heard cries of pain from Bug and Nigel who had their ears pressed against the doors trying to hear every word of Jordan's little speech to Slokum. A few seconds later, the two men recovered from their slight shock of being hit by the door, and greeted Lily and applauded Jordan for _finally _giving Slokum what he deserved. Nigel gave Jordan a high five as Bug gave Lily a soft kiss on the lips.

"Where have you been, love?" Nigel asked Lily with a hint of concern in his voice. "Buggles here was quite worried about you." He added with a much lighter tone to his voice. Jordan shook her head.

"We need you to contact one of the families of the double homicide that came in last night." Jordan told her, a smile playing on her lips.

"Okay… but why do you have that mischievous look on your face?" She asked half smiling and half too worried to smile.

"You haven't heard _who's_ family yet." Nigel told her with a look that told her this was one interesting case.

"That's it?" Lily asked, surprised.

"Expecting more?" Jordan asked with a laugh.

"No, no." Lily answered absentmindedly. "I'll tell you guys when the family is coming in, since this case seems to interest you a lot." She told them with a laugh before exiting the room.

"Wait…wait…she should be back in 3…2…1…" Nigel counted with a smile.

"Oh, my, god!" Lily exclaimed as she re-entered the room. "It's SLOKUM'S family? Too bad it wasn't him on the table…"

"Agreed, but unfortunately, it's his little brother… We think Slokum's involved…" Bug informed her, adding the last little bit under his breathe.

"Yeah…I've got some things I need to tell you three later…" She whispered.

"Secret things?" Jordan laughed.

"Well… things that are to be kept secrets in this office." Lily replied, emphasizing the last three words.

"When do we get to hear these secrets?" Nigel asked enthusiastically.

"Probably sometime tonight… seriously, this cannot wait. It's some serious stuff. It's going to take a lot of work and time on our part… but it should all work out very nicely in the end." Lily told him. Bug was quite silent during this whole discussion. He couldn't get over how amazing Lily was and that she actually liked him. He was going to have a very hard time adjusting to this new, perfect life. Now, if only Slokum would get conveniently killed… and Garrett would come back… No, Slokum didn't have to die… just disappear. He kept himself from laughing at his crazy thoughts. He didn't think he'd ever hated someone as much as he hated Slokum. He blamed his overwhelming hate for the man on the fact that Slokum didn't respect Lily… he made her work harder than anyone else in the office had to and he was never satisfied with what she did. He hated him with a passion for that. All thoughts quickly drifted out of his mind as Lily gave him a peck on the cheek before leaving the room. It took him a moment to realize Jordan and Nigel were standing there, once again, laughing at him because he was so love struck.

"Guys!" He protested before scrunching up his face, anticipating the poke in the ribs he had coming to him from Nigel.

"Awe, Bug!" Jordan poked him this time instead. "You and Lily are soooo cute together!" She laughed. He shook his head, and for what seemed like the millionth time, they set back to work on getting an ID for their second victim.

------------------------

A/N: Of course, don't own them, only Jake Fredrick. REVIEWS? Of course, anything you would like to see happen I will DEFINETLY take into account. I love incorporating things and having some feedback and suggestions from other people that don't think the way I do... as does anyone. But anyway, chapter's a bit shorter than I'd like... and not much happens that really contributes to the story _that _much, but that's okay. Well, it's twofourty in the morning now... actually my one clock says three fourty, but LUCKILY its daylight times savings of whatever... so extra hour of sleep. Ha, I'll take it!


	20. This is gonna be a hell of a week!

CHAPTER 20

Lily hung up the phone. She had just finished calling Jack Slokum's parents to tell them their youngest son had been murdered in an under investigation double homicide. She didn't give away any details because there weren't any. Slokum's family lived in New York, so they wouldn't be there right away… now she just had to tell Slokum.

"I wonder what is so serious and important that Lily has to tell us tonight." Bug wondered aloud… after much pondering inside his head, he wondered if his two friends could provide him with any insight.

"No clue Bug." Jordan told him, "Afraid it's going to interfere with your date?" She laughed.

"No, no. I don't mind… as long as I'm near her, everything's perfect." He said with a faraway look on his face. Nigel pretended to throw up as Jordan just continued to chuckle.

"So what is the plan for tonight and learning this important news anyway?" Jordan asked.

"Not sure at all, love." Nigel told her. "Why don't you make one?" He suggested, knowing that would probably be the best idea because she would do what she wanted in the end anyway.

"Fine." Jordan agreed with a smile and a nod. "After work, we'll go grab some takeout food and head to the hospital to eat supper with Woody. Then we'll visit for a while, and we'll head back to Lily's. She'll tell us what's so important… we'll discuss it and then Nigel and I will leave so Bug and Lily can have some form of a date."

"Sounds peachy." Nigel said with a smile and a nod. Bug nodded absentmindedly. It sounded great to him! Time alone with Lily at her apartment… not that it hadn't happened a million times before. It seemed he was always over there for a dinner, or just to talk and watch TV. It was just different now… everything was. She actually knew he loved her if she somehow hadn't noticed before, and she loved him back. Nothing would ever be the same again for Bug. At least, that's what he thought until he heard his cell phone ringing.

"Hello?" He asked into the receiver. "Oh! Hi Mom." Nigel tried to contain his laughter. From what he had heard, Bug's mother was quite hard on Bug, which didn't make him happy since Bug was his best friend and all, but it was the way Bug handled it that made it funny. He would talk about her, and say how tough he was going to be next time he talked to her and that he was going to stand up for himself… but here he was yet again, talking like he was a six year old in trouble. "Sorry Mom… okay. Ah, tomorrow? Tonight? I'll be there… bye Mom. Yes, love you too Mom. See you later." He snapped the phone shut with a little more anger than he had in him before the conversation.

"What's new with Mom?" Nigel asked in a bit of a mocking tone.

"She's on her way to Boston with my Dad."

"Really?" Jordan asked eagerly.

"This is going to be a hell of a week!" Nigel laughed. "Slokum's parents AND your parents here. It'll be great."

"Not for me!" Bug protested. "It's the _worst _possible thing that could happen. I mean, Lily and I just admitted our feelings towards each other in 'that' way and things are going amazingly well for us, and now my Mom's coming."

"So?" Jordan asked, "You'll get to introduce them before things get too serious… does it really matter?"

"Jordan… you don't know my Mom. It matters. She's almost as impossible as you!"

"Almost?" Nigel questioned.

"Come on Nige!" Jordan laughed, "Could anyone be as impossible as I am?"

"No, love. I will have to agree with you there." Nigel laughed, but knew it was true.

"Well… my Mom comes pretty close… but you'll see for yourselves tomorrow." Nigel and Jordan just both smiled and nodded at Bug. "Shit! My date with Lily! If my Mom comes… we won't be able to have a nice date… she'll want to spend every second with me. She'll be here, at my house, where ever I am. I'll have no life until she leaves. Seriously! Whatever this important news is that Lily has to tell us and all the stuff Nigel found about Jake… I'll have to hear it all next week, when she leaves, unless you want to tell her too… and if it's anything bad at all… no doubt she'll be at the police before you can say anything."

"Bug, it's okay. Last time your mother came to Boston you weren't friends with us, were you?" Nigel said with a sly grin.

"Nigel? What are you going to do to my mother?" Bug asked in a mock intimidated voice.

"Oh, nothing, nothing at all, it's just I have a talent for preoccupying people for large periods of time with my computer…" Nigel started.

"And being the good friends we are," Jordan added, "We may just have to alter our plans for the night and your mother, Nigel and I will go visit Woody in the hospital while you and Lily have your little date… and during your date at some point, she'll fill you in on all this mysterious, serious stuff, and then she can tell Nigel and I later while you entertain your mother." Jordan told him, a serious look on her face.

"Are you sure you want to get into this?" He asked with a surprised look on his face.

"Yes… haven't you ever had friends before Bug?" Nigel laughed.

"None of my other friends would ever have put up with my Mom for more than five minutes… and my Dad's coming too, but he is considerably passive, especially compared to my Mom."

"Really Bug, is there anyone I cannot handle?" Jordan questioned him, a half serious, and half joking look on her face.

"No Jordan, you're right. You can handle anyone." Bug said with an uneasy smile. He was afraid Jordan may have met her match in his mother… but he wasn't getting into that argument yet. They would find out for themselves later.

"Great, everything's settled then." Nigel ended the conversation.

---------------

"Dr. Slokum?" Lily asked in a softer tone than she usually used while talking to him. He immediately knew something was up… she would be angry, or scared if she knew the truth. Not here confronting him as if he was one of her clients.

"Ms. Lebowski?" He greeted her with a nod.

"I have some unfortunate news…" She started.

"Don't worry… I can handle it." He assured her.

"If you're sure." She shrugged. "It's just… there's no easy way to say it." He hadn't the slightest clue what she was talking about.

"Are you going to tell me, or not?"

"Okay. It's… you're little brother… he's, he's dead Dr. Slokum." Lily almost whispered. Slokum didn't seem too surprised at first, which supported Garrett's theories about him and his involvement… but killing your own little brother? It was such a cold hearted thing to do… Lily wondered why she was even surprised with the things she'd encountered thus far in her odd career.

"He… he is? Are you sure it's him? He was always such a good kid…" Slokum stammered, just a tad unconvincingly… but Lily figured it was only since she had talked to Garrett about it.

"I'm really sorry…" Lily attempted to console him. Normally, she really did feel sorry for her clients… but with Slokum and his suspected and she figured probable involvement in the case it made her less sorry for him. She hardly was sorry at all. It was probably his fault his little brother was dead… how could he pretend to be sad?

"Jimmy was always a good kid…" Slokum added, shaking his head.

"Jimmy?" Lily asked, surprised.

"Yes… my brother Jimmy." Slokum clarified, questioning how thoroughly she could read reports.

"Dr. Slokum, the dead man, your brother, he's named Robert. Not Jimmy…" Lily told him, a confused look on her face. She was sure he had something to do with it now. How could you have two brothers and automatically assume it was one of them that had been murdered. She knew the first question she would have asked was which brother it was… unless she had planned it herself.

"Robert?" Slokum asked, surprised… "Robert… he died years ago. 16 to be exact." Slokum told her.

"No… he did have a legal name change 16 years ago though." Lily told him. She let go the thoughts she'd had before about him making his assumptions. He thought his brother was already dead… now he has to grieve him all over again.

"Oh, god. He didn't." Slokum shook his head, trying to fight back tears. They weren't as much grieving for his brother, he'd done that for years… he was just getting to the point where he was getting better, but he really meant how could things have backfired this badly? Jimmy wasn't dead… and Robert was, now because of him, when they could have been together on this, against Jimmy, like it always was. "Robert was the baby of the family… I was the oldest. Jimmy always felt this overwhelming need to be mean to Robert, where I felt since I was the oldest it was my job to referee them." Slokum told Lily as she placed a hand on his shoulder. Things were getting less and less awkward as Lily continued to console Slokum, she got more and more convinced that he didn't do this. He couldn't have, not the way he was crying, unless he was a very, very good actor which Lily presumed he wasn't.

"It's okay." She told him. Then out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Jake Fredrick peering in the glass and watching them in disbelief. Lily pretended not to see him, because even though she was assuming allegations against Slokum were false, that didn't mean Jake Fredrick wasn't involved.

------

"Jordan you've been watching the clock for the past half hour." Nigel informed her with a grin.

"Yeah, I know." She told him with a half smile.

"Can't wait to go see Woody?" He asked, reading her mind perfectly.

"How'd you ever guess?" She asked sarcastically.

"Well, I've been watching the clock too… but wishing it was moving in the other direction." Bug muttered under his breath.

"Oh Buggles, we'll deal with your Mom okay?" Nigel reassured him. Bug just shook his head again, and continued working.

"Let's go change and meet in the lobby to tell Lily the plan, okay?" Jordan suggested, noticing they had five minutes until release time, and were getting no work done anyway… Bug and Nigel may have been, but she wasn't. The only thing she could think of was Woody, she'd been distracted by this case earlier… but as seeing him again neared, she had only him on her mind.

"Sounds good to me." Nigel said with a nod, leaving the room, practically dragging Bug with him. Jordan shook her head at her two friends and practically skipped out of the room to change and go to Lily's office.

"Lily!" Jordan called a few minutes later. She was changed and ready to go in record time… now she just needed to find her friend. She found her office empty, and as she headed down the hall to look for her, she saw her in the most unlikely of places… the one place they all tried to avoid… Jack Slokum's office. She wasn't being reprimanded either, it looked as if she was consoling him… what the hell? She was so blinded by confusion, and a slight pang of anger that she nearly took out Jake Fredrick who was standing around the corner.

"Uh, hey Jordan!" Jake greeted her with a steadying arm as she almost fell after ramming into him. Jordan wondered how the man could be so enthusiastic all the time…even after she had nearly ploughed him over. He was sort of like Woody in more than one way… she quickly dismissed the thought though.

"Hey Jake, whatcha doing?" She asked, realizing that he really had no reason to be standing at the corner outside Slokum's office.

"Oh… I don't know, I was just…" His face turned a bit red. He didn't know what he was doing, he had been going to get some papers for Santana, and then he had seen Lily and Slokum, he just got naturally curious.

"Watching your fiancée?" Jordan asked with a laugh. She had been in the position he was in too many times to bother to count. She didn't care he was spying on Slokum and Lily… he was probably as confused as she was.

"Ah, news travels fast I see." Jake said with a half embarrassed half relieved smile.

"Yep. Can't keep anything a secret here." Jordan told him, emphasizing the word anything, because if he was hiding something, maybe he'd come clean sometime soon, before she was forced to call it on him. Then maybe they could at least be friends, or something. He did seem like an okay guy.

"So I'm learning." He said with a laugh. He didn't seem like he was hiding anything important… but would people think she was if they just met her? She had a bit of a shady past herself… but that didn't mean she was a bad person. She would have to keep her judgment open. Inside, Lily got up and Slokum gave her a nod, before straightening out his suit and wiping his eyes. Slokum was crying? Jordan wondered in her head before she made the connection. His brother. But if he was crying, could he have something to do with it still? She didn't doubt it. If he was in this high of position and had a secret life of crime, he'd have to be a good actor.

"Lily, can I talk to you for a sec?" Jordan pounced on her as soon as she shut Slokum's door.

"Sure Jordan." Lily said with a nod, "Hey Jake." She smiled, looking at the ground. The realization hit Jordan that it would be awkward between the two… indirectly working in the same office, dating someone here too, pretending to be his fiancée…She couldn't help but smiling. Things were crazy around here, and she loved it. On their way to Lily's office, Jordan filled her in on all the changes in plan. Lily looked puzzled as to why Bug's mom coming here was such a big deal for Bug, but Jordan told her that Nigel and her felt the same way. They had no clue what was up with Bug's mom… but they'd find out soon enough anyways.

"Sounds like a great plan Jordan." Lily told her, a smile playing on her lips, "A little sane for you though, isn't it?" She added with a laugh. Jordan shoved her playfully as they headed to the lobby to meet Bug and Nigel.

"Ready to meet my Mom?" Bug called out as they entered the elevator.

"You know I am." Jordan told him with a playful punch to the arm. Bug pretended it hurt a lot bending over and grabbing his arm.

"Ah, stop it you two." Nigel told them with a laugh. He didn't know what kind of news Lily had… but the news he had would set a bit of a more serious tone for the night… In her head, Lily was thinking the exact same thing.


	21. Arguments

CHAPTER 21

"Mahesh! Mahesh!" The four friends heard an extremely loud women's voice calling through the airport.

"Haven't heard that in a while…" Bug muttered under his breath before putting on a big smile. "Mom! Dad!" He said, very enthusiastically. "How've you been?"

"Fine, fine." The woman said, throwing her arms around Bug. She then held him at arms length, looking him over. "You look well." She observed, pulling him back into a hug. Bug's father patted him on the back.

"Are you going to introduce us Mahesh?" He asked politely and much quieter than his wife had been. Bug looked a bit embarrassed for a minute before he finally answered.

"Yes, sorry Dad." He apologized. "This is my Mother," He said gesturing to the woman, "And my father." He concluded with a pat on his fathers shoulder. "This is Dr. Jordan Cavanaugh, Dr. Nigel Townsend and Lily Lebowski." He told his parents, gesturing to each of his friends in turn, and then taking hold of Lily's hand. Neither of Bug's parents said anything for a moment. Bug assumed it was because they were taken aback by his holding Lily's hand. He guessed they didn't expect him to have a girlfriend if he hadn't mentioned it on the phone to them before.

"Uh, do you all work at the morgue?" Bug's father stammered, regaining some composure. Bug observed that he mostly directed the question towards Lily, because she was the only one that wasn't a doctor. He hoped his mother wouldn't say anything that would embarrass him, noticing her unusual quietness. He knew she was preparing to say something, and that likely meant embarrassment on his part.

"Yes, we do." Jordan answered with a smile, obviously noticing the questions direction to Lily as well. "Nigel and I are medical examiners like…your son, and Lily is resident grief councilor." They all noticed Jordan pause before saying 'your son'. Bug assumed it was because she didn't know whether to call him Mahesh, which he was glad she had never called him before, or to call him Bug.

"I see." Bug's father said with a forced smile. Things were awkward, uncomfortable… Nigel and Jordan couldn't understand Bug's worry about his mother… she had barley spoken a word. They soon decided they shouldn't have thought that. It must have been a jinx. Almost as soon as the thought ran through their minds… Bug's mother started talking.

"Oh Mahesh!" She gushed, "I can't believe it's been this long since we've last seen you! We have so much to tell you… How about we go home? Start off our nice, quiet, _family_ week?" She suggested, hinting that he wouldn't be spending much time with his co-workers after work as long as she was here. She wanted to spend time with her son… not his co-workers at the morgue he worked at. She didn't understand why he had to work at a morgue anyway… there had to be some more productive things he could be doing with his education…

"Actually Mom," Bug started, surprising his Mom greatly. She had never heard her Mahesh question anything she had said before… "Jordan and Nigel were going to introduce you to one of our other close friends…" His mother noticed that he was holding hands with one of the girls again. They were both beautiful girls… was Mahesh dating her? She couldn't see it… but she half hoped he was. He needed to settle down with a pretty girl and start a family, but the two of them together didn't seem quite right to her… something was missing, she just wasn't sure what it was yet.

"Where are you going to be, Mahesh?" She asked him, glancing between him and Lily.

"I… well…" Bug stammered, not knowing how his Mom would feel about him and Lily going on a date.

"He's going on a date with Lily." Jordan cut in with a smirk. She didn't see why Bug was so afraid of his mother. She was no expert… but she knew if her Mom was around, they'd be close… not afraid of each other. But Jordan knew she wasn't anything remotely like Bug… so she decided to let the situation go. She just needed to make this week as easy on Bug and Lily as it could be.

"Oh, I see." Bug's mother replied. Bug just nodded throwing several grateful smiles in Jordan's direction. "Well, will I be seeing you at all this week, Mahesh?" His mother demanded.

"Yes Mom! Of course!" Bug reassured her.

"So, Mrs. Vijayaraghavensatyanaryanamurthy…" Jordan started before being cut off by Bug's mother. If she was impressed that Jordan could pronounce her last name, she didn't show it, and Jordan didn't expect her to.

"Please, call me Shyama, and my husband Alok." Jordan just continued as if she'd never been interrupted. Bug hoped the two women wouldn't get into too many arguments this week… they were both so stubborn… he didn't know who would win most of them… it would be close.

"Do you want to get going? We want to introduce you to our friend Woodrow Hoyt, we call him Woody. He's a detective… he was recently hospitalized… he's a good friend of Bug's and he'd want to meet you." Jordan told her.

"Fine, let's get going. I'll see you later Mahesh." She told him with a kiss on the cheek, separating him and Lily once again. "And you too… sorry, I can't remember the name." She told Lily with a bit of a smirk. She remembered Lily's name… she just wanted to test her. If she could put up with her and Alok for a week and still be with Mahesh… she would accept Lily.

"Lily."

"Yes, see you later too Lily." She nodded before stalking away, leaving the entire pile of luggage behind her.

"Sorry about that." Alok apologized. "You know the way she is Mahesh… wanting to spend every single second with you until we fly back. She'll come around eventually."

"That's alright Dad, see you later." Bug said, giving his Dad a hug.

"Yes. Nice meeting you Ms. Lebowski." He said with a smile and a nod. He grabbed most of the luggage, Nigel taking the remains and the two men and Jordan headed across the airport trying to keep Shyama in view.

"Sorry about that Lily." Bug apologized as soon as everyone had left. Lily took hold of his hand again.

"It's fine." She told him with a smile.

"You sure? My mom can get pretty mean… that isn't even close to what we'll see before the week ends…"

"Bug, seriously. I can handle it. Besides… you're letting me pretend to be Jake's fiancée to help him out… and I love you." She told him with a shy smile. Every time she said it she was flooded with happiness, but felt shy at the same time. She knew it was silly to feel shy around Bug. She'd known him for what seemed like forever…they'd been friends for a long time, through so much together.

"I love you too." Bug said feeling equally as shy and happy. He put his arm around Lily's waist as they walked towards the airport parking lot.

----

At the hospital, Woody was getting impatient, and worried. He knew he shouldn't be… but maybe they'd gone too fast… maybe she wasn't going to come and see him. She should have been there already because her shift was over an hour ago. She was probably just working late… or went home first. It was nothing. She'd be here. Just on queue, the nurse knocked on the door. "Detective Hoyt, you have some visitors. It's your girlfriend and some friends." She told him with a laugh. He smiled, loving how they always referred to Jordan as his girlfriend… well she was now, he hoped, but even before they had made up. "I'm assuming it's alright for them to come in?"

"Yes, yes. Thank you!" He told her. She nodded and smiled as she left to go get them. He wondered who came with her. Probably Lily, Bug and Nigel, he though. Who else would be there?

"Woody!" Jordan exclaimed as she entered the room, rushing over to his bedside and giving him a big hug.

"Hey Jo!" he told her, planting a kiss on her cheek. She sat down on the bed next to him.

"You guys coming in?" She asked.

"Yep." Woody heard Nigel say from outside the room. Then he entered, two strangers in tow. One was a larger woman, the other a smaller man. The man looked friendly, the woman looked fierce. He hadn't the slightest clue who they were. "Evening Woodrow, you look well." Nigel smiled.

"Thanks Nige, so do you." He told him.

"And who are your friends?" He asked in a casual but demanding tone.

"Oh, yes!" Jordan said, jumping up. "Sorry about that… This," She said gesturing to the man, "Is Alok Vijayaraghavensatyanaryanamurthy."

"Oh, you're Bug's parents." Woody exclaimed.

"We're Mahesh's parents…" The woman told him, with a strange look, "I'm Shyama Vijayaraghavensatyanaryanamurthy." She walked over to the bed and shook his hand.

"Nice meeting you Mrs. Vijayaraghavensatyanaryanamurthy, call me Woody. He told her with a polite boy scout smile.

"Call me Shyama." She told him with a fake smile. She didn't understand her son's friends. There was Jordan, who seemed like she was trouble, Woody, who seemed too polite to be real, Nigel who seemed fairly normal compared to the rest of the bunch, and Lily who was obviously hiding something judging by her quietness. Then there was Mahesh, or 'Bug' as Woody had referred to him as. What kind of name was Bug? A nickname because his full name was an embarrassment to him, no doubt. She would reprimand him for that later… right now he was on a _date_. She was happy he was on a date… but with his Lily? She didn't seem his type at all. He should be going out with a nice girl from our community. He should come back home with us…

"Shyama?" Jordan's voice pulled her out of her thoughts. "You okay?"

"Yes, quite fine thanks." Shyama answered with a shake of her head.

"Good to hear." Nigel piped in. Shyama didn't understand why they were there.

"What are we doing here anyway?" Shyama asked abruptly. She didn't fly all the way to Boston to spend time with Mahesh's friends… she wanted to spend time with Mahesh.

"We're visiting Woodrow. We haven't seen him in a while… well Jordan saw him this morning, but I haven't, and we were planning on coming to visit him tonight." Nigel answered her.

"That's fine, but why are Alok and I here?"

"Did you have somewhere else you needed to be?" Jordan asked with a mock tone.

"Yes, in fact I do. I should be spending time with my son." Shyama shot back.

"So you're angry because Bug is with Lily and not you?" Jordan retorted.

"I'm not angry!" Shyama practically shouted. Nigel and Alok slowly, discretely made their way to the opposite side of the room, Woody wishing he could do the same. "I don't care how much time he spends with that girl…"

"Her name is Lily." Jordan interrupted her. Shyama's eyes looked like they were going to pop out of her head. She had not been challenged like this in a while… she wasn't used to getting so worked up, but it looked as if she was going to have to get used to it this week as long as Jordan was around.

"I don't care how much time he spends with _Lily_ but I am his mother, and I have come all the way to Boston to spend time with him… I would think he'd have enough respect for me to at least entertain me the first night I'm here."

"Well I'd think you'd have enough respect for Bug that you'd call more than a few hours before you arrive in Boston to let him know you're coming. Did it occur to you he might have had plans for the week? Or do you count on him being so intimidated by you that he'll drop everything and spend every second with you?" Jordan shot back.

"You have no right to say that!" Was the only reply Shyama could come up with for the comment.

"I think I do." Jordan told her, not dropping eye contact. So Bug wasn't completely lying when he said his Mother was a bit like Jordan… they were right when they assumed Jordan could handle her.

"Maybe we should go Shyama." Alok suggested quietly. He knew his wife would be in a mad mood for the rest of the night. She always was like an argument like this… but she had never lost an argument before… he didn't know how she'd react to this. Jordan was quite a skilled arguer. Shyama didn't reply, just stalked quickly out of the room eyes fixated on the floor the whole time. Alok waited until she had left before apologizing. "I'm sorry about Shyama…"

"It's fine, no worries." Jordan told him with a smile. "I'm sorry for picking the fight."

"No, no, it's not your fault at all…" Alok reassured her. "I'm sure I'll see you tomorrow at some point…" Alok rushed out of the room, shutting the door behind him.

"Well, Bug's parents seem nice." Nigel commented as soon as Alok had left the room.

"Jordan!" Woody exclaimed, half laughing, half trying to be serious. "What was that?" He looked at Jordan, then Nigel, and all three burst out laughing.

"Bug was certainly right about his mother, wasn't he now?" Nigel asked.

"You got that right. She was asking for it though… It's obvious she doesn't like Lily… and me of course." Jordan observed.

"Oh well. It doesn't really matter anyway." Woody reassured her.

"I know. I hope she doesn't keep arguing like that. It will get boring by the end of the week." Jordan laughed.

"Not for the rest of us!" Nigel added. "Well should I fill you two in on detective Jake Fredrick?"

"What about him?" Woody asked.

"Oh… Nigel looked into him…" Jordan started.

"I found some things that don't exactly bring me comfort…" Nigel told his two friends with a shake of his head. He reached into his pocket and pulled out several pieces of paper. "Let me explain…"

----

"How do you think things are going with your Mom?" Lily asked Bug. The two were in Lily's apartment sitting comfortably on the couch.

"Oh, probably fine but I wouldn't be surprised if she and Jordan have killed each other yet, though." Bug replied. He didn't really want to think about his parents, he just wanted to concentrate on him and Lily. Lily's head was resting on his shoulder and they were just relaxing.

"I don't think she likes me." Lily told him with a bit of a laugh.

"Well… she'll have to." Bug told her pulling her a bit closer to him.

"Good." Lily smiled. "I didn't want her to get in the way of us. Do you want to know what Garrett told me today?" She asked sitting up and looking right into his eyes.

"You saw Dr. Macy today?" Bug asked excitedly. He was beginning to believe the man had disappeared off the face of the earth. He had been unreachable since he had been fired from the morgue. Even Nigel hadn't been able to find him.

"Yep! It's only been a week since he left the morgue… but it feels like forever doesn't it?"

"Definitely." Bug agreed. "So where did you see him?"

"Well, I was in my office trying to reach him and he called me." Lily told him. Bug looked surprised and she giggled. "I was really surprised. He said he needed to see me and tell me something, so we met at the coffee shop we went to last night."

"How's he doing?"

"Oh, he's doing alright… as well as he can under this situation. I'm going to explain it to you now." Bug nodded and she continued, trying to keep from laughing at the look of curious excitement and anticipation on his face. This was going to be much more enjoyable than telling Jordan and Nigel, Jordan especially. She'd be pretty mad that Garrett didn't go to her… but she'd have to get over it and help. "Garrett went home after he left us at the hospital that night. He wasn't sure what to do, he was very angry at Slokum for firing him, Riggs for shooting Woody… he was in pretty bad shape by the sounds of it. He went out to some bar to try and make himself feel better. When he was there, before he'd even had a drink, some woman that was sitting near him was in quite a distressed state. He asked her what was wrong and she started crying. Being Garrett, he comforted her, got her some water and asked if she wanted to talk about. She said she did, but not there because it wasn't safe. He took out for a drive and she told him lots of stuff. The most important thing being that she knew Slokum was working with two detectives to conspire some plan. Garrett wouldn't tell me exactly what it was… he didn't go into details… he said if I knew, I wouldn't be able to go back to the morgue until this was all over, and he didn't know when that would be. All I know for certain is that Slokum is bad news, and not just because he's a grumpy old man. When I told Garrett about Jake Fredrick he said he though Jake might be one of the detectives Slokum's working with. Garrett knew there was a double homicide coming in, and he said it had something to do with Slokum… he thinks he planned it. Since Jake came in with it… he thinks that's reason to believe Jake's involved. Maybe he has other proof, but he didn't tell me about it. But he told me there was a lot he wasn't telling me… he couldn't tell me." The expression on Bug's face was no longer excited, but still very curious, and concerned. Bug could tell Lily was upset at the thought that Dr. Macy could get hurt, killed even. Who knew how much information he was withholding? And why wasn't he going to the police? Bug decided to stop asking himself questions either he or Lily knew the answer to, and pulled Lily into a tight hug,

"He'll be alright Lily." Bug reassured her. "Don't worry. He wouldn't have told you if it wasn't safe, you know that."

"Yeah… I guess." Lily replied. She didn't know why she was so scared for Garrett… he wasn't in any immediate danger… but if Slokum caught wind of them knowing and he looked into it and found out Garrett knew almost everything… who knows what he'd do to protect whatever he was protecting.

"Don't worry. Garrett knows how to take care of himself. He'll be fine." Bug reassured Lily still holding her tightly in his arms. He really hoped Garrett was going to be okay… they needed to find out Nigel's information right away to see if it went with Lily's… why had his parents picked the worst possible time to come?


	22. Closer to the truth

CHAPTER 22

Garrett couldn't sit in his apartment anymore. He had been sitting in the same spot on his couch beside his phone for well over an hour. Lily obviously hadn't told Jordan, Nigel and Bug about anything yet… as soon as she did, he assumed he'd be overwhelmed with visitors and phone calls. He decided to go get a drink at a bar down the street. He needed to clear his head, and stop worrying about how everything was playing out with his friends. He grabbed his coat and headed down the street. As he got closer to the bar, he heard men's voices yelling in a small alleyway beside the bar. He wasn't in the mood to get involved in some fight with a bunch of guys, so he decided to try and go past the alleyway without being noticed. He quickly changed his mind when he recognized one of the voices. "If he knows anything… you're dead." Jack Slokum yelled. What was Jack Slokum doing in the alleyway at this bar threatening people? He decided to stop and listen… see if he could catch any important information.

"I swear… no one knows. I haven't said a word. Please, can I go?" A younger man's voice pleaded. Garrett didn't know who it was… he really didn't care either.

"Well someone knows. Someone screwed up. If it wasn't you… I don't know who it was." Slokum started yelling again. Garrett couldn't believe it, Slokum seemed like such an under control man. Even if he was behind some murders, Garrett would have never expected him to come out and talk to the young guys that were doing his work for him.

"Well, I swear… It wasn't me Slokum; it must've been someone else. I know you've got other guys working on it…" The second voice yelled back.

"Could you refrain from yelling out my name? What if someone hears you?" Slokum hissed a tinge of nervousness present in his regularly confident voice.

"No one's listening to us anyway." The man reassured him. "Don't worry! No one cares that you killed…" Slokum punched the guy out before he could finish the sentence. Garrett crept past and into the bar before taking out his cell phone and calling Renee Walcott. He told her he needed to meet with her, it was urgent. She told him to come to her office as soon as he could if it was that urgent. He hung up and headed back outside. He had to get his car and get to Renee's office as soon as he could. He passed Jack Slokum as he left the bar. Garrett could feel Slokum's eyes staring into him, but he couldn't make eye contact. Not after what he'd just witnessed. As soon as Garrett got outside, he went back into the alleyway to see if the guy was alright. He started to get worried when he got no response when he asked if anyone was there. He swallowed hard and headed down the alleyway, hoping the guy wasn't going to jump him or anything.

"Are you okay?" Garret asked before stumbling and noticing a body lying beside a garbage dumpster. "Shit!" It appeared that Slokum had beaten the guy up pretty badly. Garrett whipped out his cell phone and dialed 911. He told them where he was and hoped it wouldn't take too long before the ambulance got there.

------------------

"Okay, I don't know how this relates to what Lily found out today, but this is what I've got." Nigel started to explain his story. "Jake Fredrick, born in San Francisco to a Mrs. Helen Fredrick and a Mr. Barry Fredrick. He has a younger sister named Samantha. There was a boy named Trevor living with them, Mrs. Fredrick's best friend's son. The best friend was killed when Trevor was 15 and he started living with the Fredrick's. Jake was 10 at the time, Samantha was 7. Trevor seemed to stay around indefinitely. He was still living at home with the Fredrick's when Jake went off to University. He got his degree and went into training to be a police officer. Seemed to be a good kid. Participated in extra curriculars in high school and university, impressive marks. Samantha was a different story. She started having a lot of problems when she was 8. She went from being described as an 'energetic, optimistic student' to being described as 'withdrawn, lacks social skills, socially inept.' Something went wrong. Mr. Fredrick was an accountant, Mrs. Fredrick a secretary. Trevor never seemed to do anything with his life. He lived with the Fredrick's until he died at the age of 27. Never went to university, never really kept a job, he isn't even recorded as ever graduating high school." Nigel paused to give Jordan and Woody a chance for comments thus far.

"Nigel, it's truly creeping me out how much stuff you can find out of people in that amount of time." Jordan told him with a smile.

"This family was a piece of cake. Everything was in one file on some shrink's computer." Nigel told them, not sure whether to take Jordan's comment as a compliment or not.

"Okay, but they seemed like a typical family… I could see the girl going for some counseling if she suddenly changed… but the whole family?"

"It's seems Jake and his father didn't take a real liking to Trevor. Mrs. Fredrick did since it was her best friend's son, but Mr. Fredrick didn't like him apparently, and convinced Jake to do the same."

"Understandable." Jordan observed, "How was Trevor killed?"

"There was never an investigation done. Suicide note written in Trevor's writing, overdose of pills taken and the pills were ones that shouldn't have been taken with alcohol in the first place." Nigel told her.

"But?" Woody prompted, knowing Nigel had some more information, or a theory.

"I don't know, it just doesn't seem to make sense. Samantha continued to be withdrawn from social activity and interaction of any kind all through high school. She moved to New York to go to university, and her situation seemed to improve. It must have been something at home that was making her upset." Nigel answered.

"Probably the same thing that made Trevor commit suicide?" Jordan suggested.

"But why didn't it affect Jake at all?" Woody asked confused. "There can't be something that makes this man commit suicide and this girl become socially withdrawn for most of her life that didn't affect a child living in the same household."

"Agreed." Nigel nodded, "Looks like we have a little more work to do."

"Maybe Jake can help us…" Jordan said an idea popping into her head.

"Jordan…" Both men warned.

"What? I'm not going to go up to him and ask. We'll make a plan." She laughed at their concern. "Thanks for being all worried though." She added with a smirk.

"Awe. I just can't wait to get out of here so I can help." Woody groaned.

"Ah, don't worry Farm boy. You're getting out of here soon aren't you?"

"Yeah, on Sunday actually," Woody answered with a smile, "that is if nothing else goes wrong…"

"It won't." Nigel reassured him. "So I wonder what Bug and Lily are up to? I hope they went to Lily's apartment because I'm assuming Shyama and Alok have invaded Bug's by this time." Nigel chuckled.

"I can't believe those two are together." Woody shook his head.

"I can't believe _you two _are together." Nigel shot back with a smile. Jordan smile grew wider as she looked at Woody.

"Yeah, everything seems to be working out." Jordan nodded. "When do you think Lily's going to get here?"

"Oh, actually, I'm supposed to pick her up…" Nigel said. "In ten minutes, so I better get going."

"Alright, don't take too long Nige." Jordan told him.

"Are you sure?" Nigel laughed back. Jordan looked around for something to throw at him, but he quickly ducked out of the room shutting the door behind him.

--------

"He's over here!" Garrett called as he saw the ambulance attendants rushing out with a stretcher. He started to explain the man's condition, but no one appeared interested so he just kept out of it.

"Good thing you called this in when you did." Someone told Garrett as they were loading the man's body into the ambulance. "You saved his life." Garrett forced a smile and nodded. A few police cars pulled up, and an officer got out to talk to Garrett.

"I'm Officer Larson; could you answer a few questions for me?" The officer asked Garrett.

"Sure. I'm Garrett Macy." He supplied feeling awkward leaving out the title of Chief Medical Examiner at the Boston City Morgue that usually followed his name. He didn't even bother to use Dr. anymore.

"Do you know what happened?"

"I decided to come down to the bar and get a drink… my apartments just down the street," Garrett started, gesturing in the general direction of his building. "I was walking towards the bar when I heard some yelling coming from the alleyway. I didn't want to get involved in whatever it was, you know, so I decided I would just try to get by without being noticed and go into the bar, but then I recognized one of the voices."

"Who's was it?" Officer Larson jumped at the unusual lead.

"Dr. Jack Slokum." Garrett answered with pursed lips. He knew it was quite an accusation to make, but he knew it was true.

"Oh. Are you sure?" Officer Larson clarified.

"Yes, I'm sure." Garrett told him. He realized how bad this was going to look. He was accusing Slokum of beating up some guy in an alleyway only a week after he had taken his job. He'd be lucky if anyone believed him.

"Wait!" Officer Larson exclaimed something going off in his memory. Garrett knew exactly what it was going to be. "You're Garrett Macy!" He said the name with new meaning this time. "Didn't Jack Slokum just take over your job at the Boston City Morgue?"

"Yes. He did." Garret answered trying desperately not to change the tone in his voice.

"Okay…" Officer Larson told him, making a note on his pad. "What happened next?"

"Well, I was a bit curious to see what Dr. Slokum was doing shouting with some men in an alleyway, so I decided to listen for a moment." Garrett went on to describe the conversation the two men had had. He made sure to say he heard the man he didn't know call Slokum by his name… and the part about the murders. Officer Larson seemed to forget about the question he had asked about Slokum taking Garrett's job moments before as the evidence seemed to build up against Jack Slokum. As long as the man that had been taken away in the ambulance made it and could confirm all this information… they had what seemed to be a solid case.

"Alright, you'll just have to come down to the station with me to confirm everything…" Garrett nodded. He had to go to the station to see Renee anyway. She'd probably be angry he'd taken so long after stressing the urgency… but all the information was going to get to her anyway, he just wouldn't be the one to tell her.

--------

Bug glanced over at the clock on Lily's wall. "What time is Nigel coming to pick you up?" He asked her.

"Um, in about ten minutes." She told him with a hint of disappointment their time together was ending. Bug was still holding Lily in a hug. He knew how much she was worried about Garrett. He was worried too. He was glad that Dr. Macy didn't tell Lily too much though, because if he told her something that got her hurt, or worse, Bug would kill him.

"Oh." He replied, catching her eye. They sat there for a second, staring into each others eyes before Lily leaned in and kissed him. He was so surprised at the action, even though it had happened twice the previous day, so it took a second before he responded. But he did, and the kiss was an amazing one. It reminded them, if possible, just how much they were in love. They were made for each other. The kiss went on for what seemed like forever before they pulled away. Then they just sat together on the couch in silence, Lily wrapped up comfortably in Bug's arms. They sat there for several minutes before they heard a knock on the door. "Must be Nige." Bug stated the obvious before reluctantly getting up. Lily followed suit and they were both standing at the door. Lily pulled it open and there stood Nigel.

"Was I interrupting anything?" Nigel asked with a laugh.

"No Nigel, you were not. We were expecting you." Lily told him with a playful shove.

"Just checking!" He defended himself. Bug just shook his head.

"Have fun at the hospital you guys, I know I'll be enjoying myself with my parents."

"Oh Bug, you'll be fine." Lily reassured him. She smiled sweetly and gave him a peck on the lips. Nigel pretended to gag before receiving another shove, this time from Bug.

"You people are always pushing me around." He complained as he and Lily headed to his car waving goodbye to Bug as he headed to his own car.

"So how was the date?" Nigel asked as he and Lily drove toward the hospital.

"Great." Lily answered with a smile. Nigel smiled too. He loved seeing Bug and Lily and Jordan and Woody this happy… but it sort of made him wish he had someone. He'd work on that department after they got this whole Slokum thing worked out for good.

------------

"So… what do you think about all this 'Jake' stuff?" Jordan asked Woody only seconds after Nigel had left the room.

"I'm not really sure… I just want to meet the guy first. I mean, he seemed to make a fine first impression on you…" Woody answered with a mock jealous grin. It earned him a soft punch in the arm from Jordan. "Hey! What was that for?" He tried to keep from laughing. "You're gonna have to pay for that!"

"Oh, I bet I will." She told him laughing now as well. The laughter suddenly stopped and Jordan felt Woody's lips on hers. It was definitely a feeling she was going to get used to, and she didn't mind at all. "Pay enough?" She asked him, staring right into his baby blue eyes, trying to keep a serious face.

"Ha! Not even close." He told her. With that, they kissed again… a little longer and more passionately this time. After the kiss ended, Woody was the first one to speak this time. "I really want to meet Jake." He told Jordan his face dead serious. If this guy was really in love with Jordan, he wanted to know him, and make sure he would never, ever put Jordan in danger. Woody never wanted to lose Jordan, and he wasn't going to let some stupid detective get in the way of them being happy together.

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"Nigel…" Lily started, "When are _you _going to get a girlfriend?" He shook his head with a smile. How did she read his mind?

"What are you, my mother?" He asked with a nervous laugh. He didn't like this topic being put under pressure. He knew how Jordan felt all those times Woody put the pressure on her to step things up a notch… but this was a bit different. No one was pursuing him… no one even liked him, in that way, and he didn't have time to get acquainted with someone new. Then there was the factor of Sara… he didn't even want to think about her anymore.

"No, but seriously Nigel, you deserve a happy relationship. You're a really great guy!" Lily told him.

"I don't need any cheering up Lily. I'm perfectly happy right now, you know." Nigel told her with a smile.

"Nigel, I'm serious!" She told him.

"Okay, okay. I don't know. I _do _want something like you and Bug and Woody and Jordan have… but you guys all just sort of found each other you know? You weren't out searching for a date… you were just living your lives, happily single, and came across each other. That seems to be the way to go these days." Nigel told her, eyes firmly fixated on the road.

"Oh Nige." She told him, "You'll find someone too… and you know there is nothing wrong with actually looking for someone, right?"

"Yeah, but where's the time? I'll think about it again after this whole Slokum/Garrett thing is over."

"Okay." Lily nodded, not wanting to further press the subject. He seemed to have his mind set. She could understand why he wasn't keen to go looking for a relationship. His last one with Sara hadn't turned out the best… she had used him, and if that kept him from being happy in a relationship for much longer… Lily would have to convince Jordan they'd have to intervene. She doubted she'd have much trouble.

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"This is Officer Narron. This is Dr. Garrett Macy." Officer Larson introduced him to another detective who would formally write down his statement. He proceeded to tell his story just as he had before. This officer had the same basic reactions to the story as Officer Larson had although he wasn't quite as obvious in showing it.

"Thanks for your time, Dr. Macy. You understand that because of your position on the situation, we can't do anything to Dr. Slokum without conformation from Mr. Grayson."

"So he's going to be alright?" Garrett asked hopefully.

"Yes, he should be fine." Officer Narron nodded with a smile at the doctors' sincerity.

"So I can go?" Garrett asked.

"Yes, you're free to go." Office Narron told him. He watched as the doctor stalked out of the room, but instead of leaving the station, he headed down towards Renee Walcott's office and went inside. He wondered for a minute why Garrett Macy would be going to see Renee Walcott, but dismissed the thought. He knew he didn't care enough to go and find out. If something interesting was going on there, everyone would hear about it in the office by tomorrow anyways.

A/N: Of course, don't own them... you know the deal.  
Thanks to everyone who's been reviewing.  
And yeah, I'm not up on all this Londer/Liverpoolian stuff! Sorry about that... but yeah, I'm not really up on that sort of thing.  
So sorry, and keep reviewing! Thanks, muchlove, Dayna!


	23. Talking Back

CHAPTER 23

"Hey Woody, Hey Jordan!" Lily exclaimed as she walked into the hospital room. Nigel followed her in; making sure Jordan wasn't going to throw anything at him first.

"Hey Lily! Don't worry Nige, I'm not going to throw anything at you." She laughed. Lily looked mildly confused for a second, before snapping back to her happy mood. She decided to tell them about her talk with Garrett right away, and then listen to Nigel.

"You guys up for a story?" Lily suggested.

"Sure." Woody agreed, eager to hear anything more about this whole situation. He hoped Lily's news had something to do with Jake too.

"Well, today I saw Garrett and…"

"You saw Garrett?" Jordan interrupted rather loudly. When had Lily seen Garret, and why didn't she take her with her?

"Yeah, I um met him for some coffee this afternoon." Lily answered. She didn't know how Jordan was going to react, but she knew how she expected her to.

"Oh…" Was all Jordan said. Lily assumed she'd be angry, but she just looked hurt. "Go on… sorry for interrupting."

"Okay." Lily nodded before continuing with her story. She told them everything that Garrett had told her. It still didn't make anymore sense than it did the first time she heard it.

"That's very confusing. Are you sure you aren't forgetting anything?" Nigel asked after a moment of silence.

"Nope. I'm sure. It's confusing to me too… Garrett told me he couldn't tell me anything for my own safety or something."

"We've definitely got some work to do." Woody commented. Everyone paused and waited for Jordan to say something. They all knew she would be hurt, angry, sad, but they didn't know how she'd react.

"I can't believe he didn't tell me!" Jordan pouted. She knew she was acting like a little kid, but she really didn't understand. She was really, really mad at Garret, even more angry than she had been before. Before, she was in denial. She didn't think that Garrett, the man she looked up to for being so honest and open when it came to his work life, had been hiding something for all this time. It didn't seem real… it seemed like it was all Slokum's fault. None of it would have happened if it wasn't for Slokum… but then Garrett got a chance to possibly make things better, and he went to Lily, not her? She couldn't believe it! Why wouldn't he have gone to her?

"Jo?" Woody asked softly. She just shook her head and continued to think. She didn't know what else to say. "Jo," Woody repeated, "You can't be mad at Garrett for not telling you."

"Why not?" Jordan asked in a voice just above a whisper.

"Because he didn't." Was all Woody could come up with.

"So?" Jordan shot back. She knew they were all as confused by this as she was… she had to handle this like an adult, not a 12 year old child. "Fine. What are we going to do about it?" She asked.

"Well… I'd say we start by telling Lily what I know?" Nigel asked.

"Sounds great." Woody answered. He was glad Jordan decided to stop pouting. Although it was cute, they needed to fix these problems. He needed to get out of the hospital, and help fix these problems. He could do so much more if he was at his apartment… he could meet Jake for starters.

"Good." Nigel nodded before proceeding to tell Lily exactly what he found about Jake.

"The stories really don't relate at all." Lily shook her head after Nigel had finished talking.

"Yeah, I know, it's all too weird." Woody agreed. "I will try my best to make some more sense of it once I'm out of here."

"Good to know." Jordan smiled at him.

"Yep." Nigel added in awkwardly.

"So what should we do now?" Lily wondered, not sure whether they should hurry and do more research or wait until Woody was able to help them. Then Woody had a stroke of brilliance.

"Oh! That makes a bit of sense now!" He laughed.

"What?" Nigel asked him curiously.

"I knew Dr. M wasn't telling me something this afternoon! That's what it is!" He regretted the words as soon as they left his lips, but was sort of relieved. He would have felt bad if he hadn't said something to Jordan about it… it would look bad if it ever came out, he knew they didn't need any more trust issues. He did know Jordan wouldn't react to the news well. He almost cringed, waiting for her to say something.

"What do you mean?" Jordan asked. She was even madder than she had been before. Had Woody forgotten about this earlier? Or had he just wanted to spare her the emotions?

"Dr. Macy… he came to see me this afternoon really randomly and I completely forgot until right this second because the weird thing is, he said practically nothing. Hello, how are you, good, bye. That was pretty much it. It was like he was checking to see if I knew something… I guess this must have been it. I knew there was something he wasn't saying, something like this, but now I know what it was."

"Oh." Lily said quickly, before Jordan blew up, or said anything. Jordan just sat there. She looked furious, just like she had while she was fighting with Bug's parents.

"What are we going to do about it?" Jordan asked.

"That's it?" Nigel blurted out.

"If you mean why aren't I yelling and getting mad and running off… yeah, well I've decided maybe it's time to grow up and accept things for what they are… it's obvious Garrett doesn't want to talk to me. I'll have to accept that." Jordan told him with a faraway smile. Everyone knew she didn't want to handle it like an adult… but were glad they wouldn't have to do Jordan control right then. They were all tired, and they needed to devise a plan to figure this entire mess out.

------------

"Mahesh! Where have you been?" His Mother demanded as soon as he opened the door of his apartment.

"You knew I was on a date with Lily!" Bug shook his head as he locked the door.

"Yes… but shouldn't it have been over a while ago?" His Mother asked another question.

"Nope. I just left her place and came right here." He told her. She could never remember at time where his attitude had been so negative. She had never heard him talk back to her his entire life… and he moves here and get's these friends… and he's plain rude.

"Well how was the date?" His Dad interjected, trying to do some damage control, before any damage got done.

"Good, fine, great." Bug answered quietly. "Anything exciting happen or is anything exciting planning to happen? Or can I go to bed?"

"Nothing." Shyama told him quickly, which informed him something exciting happened.

"What happened?" He asked his father.

"Well…" Alok started, getting curious glances from his son, and daggers from his wife. "Jordan and you Mother had a misunderstanding…"

"Jordan beat you at an argument?" Bug laughed. Good for Jordan! Maybe his Mom would learn a thing or two… maybe she'd get a little nicer.

"She didn't really…" Shyama started, feeling very embarrassed. It only then dawned on her how horrible it was to be told off like that… and how many people she'd told off.

"She did." Alok added with a smirk. He couldn't help it. He couldn't remember ever talking back to Shyama… ever. She had always be the one bossing everyone around… and he'd never wondered why before. He'd just accepted it and gotten used to pleasing her.

"Ah, yes. Jordan is quite skilled." Bug laughed before heading into his bedroom and flopping onto the bed. He just lay they for a few minutes, thinking about the last two days. He couldn't believe that after all the kisses and confessions… he still couldn't get over the fact he was Lily Lebowskis' boyfriend. He didn't want to concern his parents, so he held in the laughter when he thought about how Matt Seely would react to the news. He couldn't wait for work tomorrow. For once in his life, he actually wanted to see the conceded, blonde detective.

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"Garret!" Renee said with no expression as he entered her office and sat rigidly down in a chair.

"Sorry I'm late Renee." He told her with a small smile.

"What's your excuse? I thought this was pretty important?" She asked him, raising an eyebrow. He felt like a high school student sitting in his principal's office. He smiled at the thought which earned him another raised eyebrow and he started talking.

"After I got fired… I went out to a bar and…" He continued with his story. Except this time, when he got to the part he hadn't told Lily, he paused.

"Go on, Garrett. This is sounding promising." She told him with an encouraging smile. She seemed to have forgotten about being ticked off about his being late for their informal, impromptu meeting.

"Sorry, it's just… I haven't told anyone else this yet." He told her with an embarrassed smile.

"Who else have you given information to?" She questioned him.

"Uh, Lily. That's it." He told her. He failed to mention that he had instructed Lily to tell most of the morgue staff about it.

"Okay. Tell me. I think I can handle it." She told him with a smile but a look in her eyes that he read as _you better talk Garret._ Fine. I'll tell her everything, he thought to himself before opening his mouth and continuing.


	24. I'll wait

A/N: Same deal, don't own anything except for Jake Fredrick and whatever else I made/make up. Just wondering, is anyone reading all of this or is it just too long and boring? Ha, just wondering but anyways review and let me know okay thanks!

CHAPTER 24

"So… what's the plan of attack?" Nigel asked, breaking the awkward silence that had engulfed the room after Jordan's unusual response to Garrett not going to see her.

"I don't know." Lily said flatly.

"No clue." Woody said after a minute. He did have a few ideas… but he wanted Jordan to come up with a plan. Other than the fact that Jordan's plans usually worked no matter how much trouble they got in for them, he thought she needed to be the one to initiate a plan since she was the one that was mad at the man they were trying to help.

"What's everyone looking at me for?" Jordan asked.

"We thought you might have a plan, love." Nigel told her. "Your plans do usually work."

"Oh, I thought no one like my plans. They're usually criticized and I end up getting yelled at about thinking about the consequences before acting."

"Jo… you're plans always work." Woody told her, slipping an arm around her shoulder, pulling her closer to him than she presently was. She had been sitting on the edge of the bed, and now she was sitting right up beside him.

"Well I don't think Garrett wants my help." Jordan said trying not to let it get to her. She should be over this already… she was trying to handle it like an adult, but it was hard for her. Garrett had been like a father to her once Max left… and now he left her too? Now there was no one who had always been there for her. No one. Everyone had left. Then she realized who was holding her tightly while she was pouting because no one loved her and everyone had left her. She was in a room full of people who hadn't let her down yet. Woody loved her… she knew that. He had never let her down, not yet anyways. Lily and Nigel were always there for her too. She needed to help Garret whether he wanted her to or not… she could ignore him later.

"He needs your help Jordan. Whether he wants it or not… he needs you." Lily told her.

"Fine. Let's make a plan." Jordan said with a small smile. She did have people who were there for her and loved her. There were three perfect examples deviously devising a plan with her right then… She had a lot to be happy about. She had a lot to be mad about too… but maybe it was time for her to start focusing on the positive side of things.

----------

"Okay. So I was driving aimlessly around the streets making sure I didn't go anywhere that I'd have to stop because I wanted to here everything she had to say about Slokum. She said he was working with two detectives, and then she paused, as if she was too scared to say anything else. I told her it was okay… that everything would be fine if she told me… I know it's the oldest trick in the book, but she was pretty intoxicated and it seemed to comfort her, and she continued. She proceeded to tell me about her involvement in the whole situation. She was Slokum's sister in law, Jim Slokum's wife. She said that Slokum was out to kill Jimmy because of things from the past. The two brother's hated each other and were constantly putting each other in the hospital, but then Slokum got sent away to live with his grandmother when he was around fifteen because the two fought so badly. They hadn't seen each other in years… but the night previous to the one I talked to her, she had run into Slokum and he told her that if she and Jimmy didn't leave Boston immediately they'd both be dead. He was armed when he told her and he made sure she knew it. They also have two children and he threatened them as well. She was terrified because Slokum then proceeded to grab a man that was walking by… she didn't know if he knew him or not… and he took both the man and her into his car and to some building. I'm pretty sure she was intoxicated then as well because she doesn't really remember that much, but he killed the man in front of her, and told her if anyone found out… he'd kill everyone involved and her and her family. She was terrified, I'm positive she was telling the truth. I hope she's still alive… she asked me to drop her off right the second she was finished the story. I protested but she insisted so I did as I was asked. I hope nothing's happened to her…" Garrett had been staring down at his hands while he was telling the story. He looked up and met Renee's eyes. She knew he wasn't lying.

"Garrett," she started, "Why didn't you come to me earlier? It would have helped. We have to find this woman and get a formal statement pronto!"

"I was still processing it all. Sorry." Garrett said in a very quiet voice. He hoped he hadn't jeopardized the woman and her families' lives.

"Did you get a name?"

"No, sorry. I told you everything I know." He told her with a sincerely sorry smile.

"That's okay. How are you doing otherwise?" Renee asked him.

"Oh… I've been alright." She gave him a look of disbelief. "Fine, I've been miserable, lonely and drinking too much." He admitted.

"Have you eaten anything today?" She asked in a very concerned voice.

"I had some breakfast this morning… but nothing since. I've hardly eaten all week. I've been so worried and paranoid about this whole ordeal…"

"Why don't we go get some dinner?" She suggested.

"Sounds good." He agreed. He wondered if it was a friendly gesture or if she was trying to tell him that she wanted to take another stab at a relationship with him. He really didn't care. Either was fine for him, although he did prefer the second option a little.

-------------

"Well..." Jordan started on their third attempt at a plan. The first two hadn't been practical and probably wouldn't have worked. "What we need to do is prove Slokum is behind something that will get him locked up and out of the office, right?" Three heads nodded in agreement. "Because after we get him locked up we can get Garrett back and that will make it easier to prove everything else we think Slokum's behind." More nods of agreement urged her to continue. "So… we know that the first victim in this double homicide is Slokum's brother Robert…"

"Who Slokum apparently thought was dead for 16 years." Lily added in, getting some incredulous looks. "He did!" She told them with a smile.

"Okay… Slokum's Brother Robert who Slokum apparently thought was dead for the last sixteen years. Who is the other man?" Jordan wondered.

"Slokum's other brother?" Lily suggested.

"Maybe… that might make sense." Nigel contemplated.

"Well that's who Slokum thought was dead." Lily told them.

"Do you know anything else Lily?" Woody asked with a laugh.

"I don't think so." She answered with a sheepish smile. "Slokum just started talking about his brother Jimmy… and then I told him it was Robert and he told me that was impossible because Robert had died sixteen years ago, and I told him that that was the time he had a legal name change."

"You'd think Slokum would have noticed." Jordan commented.

"Well if your brother dies are you going to research him on the computers to see if he had a legal name change?" Woody asked.

"No, I guess not." Jordan smiled. She shook her head and laid it head down on Woody's chest. Nigel and Lily smiled as they saw Woody's smile get a hundred times bigger than it had been before.

"So the plan is to run tests and see if the other vic is Jim Slokum?" Nigel asked.

"Sounds good to me." Jordan agreed. Lily and Woody nodded and everything seemed settled. They all knew it wasn't much of a plan… but it was all they were going to get done for the night, so it would work for now.

"Well… I better get going. Do you want a ride Lily?" Nigel asked.

"That'd be great. See you tomorrow Jordan, and maybe you too Woody!" Lily said.

"Bye, yep, see you tomorrow!" Jordan nodded.

"Bye!" Woody added before Nigel and Lily shut the door. "They left pretty quickly." He observed with a smile.

"They did." Jordan agreed. She shifted in Woody's grasp so that she was looking into his eyes. She just stared into his eyes for a few minutes, memorizing every detail of his pale, baby blue eyes. Then she moved in the slightest bit closer and kissed him.

----------

"Where do you want to go?" Garrett asked Renee. They were pulling out of the parking lot and going out for dinner… Garrett wasn't sure how Renee perceived this dinner either. He didn't know if it was a friend's thing, or a date. Should he go to a sit in restaurant, if so, how fancy? Or was he to go to a bar? He hadn't a clue.

"How about that Italian place a few blocks over?" She suggested, which told him that she considered it to be more a 'date' than a 'grab a bite to eat with a friend' thing. He didn't mind it one bit. He had missed Renee; he was still in love with her.

"Sure." He agreed, knowing that there was no point in arguing. Renee was so much like Jordan, that it wasn't even funny. The two women hated each other. He figured it was because they didn't like the other's attitude, and couldn't realize they were identical.

"Good." She smiled as Garrett parked a block away from the restaurant. They both got out of the car and headed down the street. Renee could sense Garrett's confusion on what this dinner meant exactly… and she herself wasn't too sure. She still had feelings for Garrett, well that was an understatement, and she was still in love with him. She didn't know how he felt about her… but he was here, wasn't he? Then she realized the way she was thinking. She was always independent and sure of herself… if she was in love with Garrett Macy, she was going to do something about it.

-------------

"Isn't it crazy?" Lily marveled to Nigel as they headed toward his car.

"Completely." He agreed. "We were barley out of the room, and they were making out!" He added with a hint of disgust in his voice.

"Oh, Nige." Lily smiled at his child like disgust at the image. "But it's great they finally are together… after all these years."

"You're one to talk!" Nigel pointed out with a smile. "You and Bug have been doing some making out of your own if I'm not mistaken."

"Oh shut-up!" Lily told him with a shove.

"I see you don't enjoy it as much when you're the center of attention." Nigel observed very knowingly.

"You didn't seem to bask in it either earlier you know." She reminded him.

"Fine, fine." Nigel admitted, "But my situation is a bit different. You're talking about how happy you are because you have someone… and I'm talking about how unhappy I am because I don't."

"There, you said it." Lily smiled.

"Said what, love?" Nigel asked curiously.

"That you're unhappy because you don't have someone. You didn't admit that before. You said you were fine."

"So what?"

"So find a date!"

"It's not that easy, you know that!"

"Well you're not making any effort at all!"

"And you tried so hard for the last, what was it, three years?"

"Shut up Nigel." Lily laughed, putting an end to the serious discussion, well it was almost an argument if you wanted to get technical… but it was over now. "Thanks for the ride Nigel." Lily smiled before she hopped out of the car and headed into her apartment. Nigel waved goodbye before driving away. He hated discussions about dates. It seemed everyone who didn't have one did. He wanted a date, but when did he have time to find one? He decided to forget the last few conversations he'd had about dating and stick to his original plan. He'd find a date after this whole Slokum ordeal was done.


	25. I need help

CHAPTER 25

A/N: Okay, Nigel will have someone by the end, I promise. Lol, I want him to be happy too! Anyways, I started this chapter long ago… but now I'm finishing it and publishing it. Third snow day of the year! They always come on the most convenient days too! First one was the day of the Crossing Jordan marathon so I got to watch that all day instead of writing a geography test… now today I don't have to go to school and get in trouble for not doing my homework haha, another long weekend! Well, anyway, onto Chapter 25!

This is sort of a new note, I wrote like half this story a long while ago, and now it's the end of December and I'm writing some more ha, sorry about the very, very long wait but I just kind of tired myself of this story, but that's alright, I'm back with it now!

**xXxXx**

"This is a nice restaurant." Garrett observed as he and Renee were waiting for their meals to be delivered to the table.

"It is." Renee agreed with a smile.

"Renee…" Garrett started. His eyes had been looking into hers but he dropped them down to look at the placemat in front of him. She knew what he was going to say. He was going to ask what this meant. She could read him like a book. "What is this dinner supposed to mean? Does it mean we want to give this, us, another chance? Or is this just a 'friends' thing?" She knew that she wanted to give them another chance. She felt they deserved another chance.

"Well, I'd like to give us another chance." She told him. She sat there for a few seconds while he digested the information. Finally he looked up at her.

"You do?" He sounded more surprised than he looked.

"I do." She told him with a grin.

"I was hoping you'd say that." He admitted. They both sat there for a moment, grinning like idiots until the waiter interrupted.

"Here you are." He told them placing their plates down on the table.

"Thanks." Garrett nodded to the waiters back as he walked away.

"Looks good." Renee observed. Garrett nodded in agreement before they started their meal.

--------------

"I can't believe it!" Shyama raged to her husband in her son's guestroom.

"Can't believe what?" Alok asked, hiding his smile. Being in Boston and realizing that he didn't have to sit by and be bossed around by his wife his whole life had given him a slight boost of self confidence.

"You know very well what!" Shyama spat back at him. She really could not believe it. "Mahesh is talking back to me, his friends are downright rude, and he's got a girlfriend!"

"Aren't you the one that is always encouraging our son to get married and have children?" Alok pointed out.

"Not with this Lily…" She told him with a look of disgust on her face.

"Why not?" Alok wondered. He saw nothing wrong with any of it.

"Because. Just because something isn't right." Shyama told her husband.

"That doesn't make any sense. If this is who Mahesh loves… then I say, let him do what he wants." Alok argued.

"Well what about this Jordan?" Shyama started on a new topic seeing as the last discussion was a lost cause.

"What about her?" Alok questioned. It was getting really, really hard to keep from smiling now.

"Look at the way she treated me!" Shyama exclaimed.

"You two had an argument… she won. Do you know how many people you've made feel the way you do now? I can't even keep count… it's a very big number. It's called getting a taste of your own medicine."

"Now I can't believe you!" Shyama exploded. "You and Mahesh are being so disrespectful to me."

"How can you expect us to go our whole lives living by your rules, doing what you want?" Alok shot back, "You can't expect us to keeping throwing away what we want for you. Not all the time. Yes, sometimes you have to make sacrifices for you family… but Mahesh and I are the only ones making the sacrifices. You always get what you want, when you want."

"I'm not going to have this discussion with you." Shyama told him. "Goodnight Alok."

"Goodnight." They both climbed into the double bed in their son's guest room and went to sleep without another word.

---------------

After saying goodbye with a lot of kissing, Jordan was on her way home from the hospital. She was thankful the nurses didn't put up a fuss about her staying well past visiting hours. They just smiled and told her that they were glad things were working out between Woody and Jordan because he was so sad without his girlfriend around, and a happy Woody was better than a sad Woody. She laughed at that, thanked them and promised to come back and visit the next night as well. She got into her car and drove back to her apartment. When she got in she had a message on her machine so she got a beer and sat down on her couch, pressing the play button on her way by.

"Hey Jordan, its Jake Fredrick. I was just wondering… well can you call me? Okay, here's my number…" He wanted her to call him? She had just met him the day before, and he knew she had Woody. What could he possibly want? One way to find out. She picked up the phone and dialed. "Fredrick." Jake's voice answered smoothly and calmly. He didn't sound like he needed any help…

"Hey Jake, its Jordan… you called?" She asked, hoping it was something important because she did have to work the next day… she wanted to sleep sometime.

"Jordan! I'm glad you called." He exclaimed, sounding relieved.

"What did you need?" She asked, getting straight to the point. She really didn't want to be talking to him; she really wanted to be sleeping.

"Well… it's a long story, but I need help." Jake sighed quietly into the phone.

"You need help?" She repeated. Why was he calling her for help? Didn't he have any friends that actually knew him and didn't suspect him of involvement of murder?

"Yeah… it's confusing, but I thought maybe you could help me. I'm in a lot of trouble right now." He confessed. Jordan didn't know what to say. She knew that Woody would kill her if she invited Jake over because well, he'd be jealous, and also, Jake was in trouble apparently, and they already suspected him of being involved in some pretty dangerous murders…

"I could try to help you." She blurted out. Her curiosity won, as always.

"It's not…" He started but couldn't think of the right word to say, well he could, but he figured it would scare her away.

"Safe?" She guessed.

"Yeah." He admitted. Jordan knew she shouldn't help, but she couldn't help but remembering all those times that Woody shouldn't have helped her, and he ended up saving her life… but then again, now they were in love, did she want to be in love with Jake? No, she was happy with Woody… but he just needed a friend to help him out.

"I'll help you, I know how it feels to need help in an unsafe situation, trust me." Jordan laughed. "But can this wait until tomorrow, I'm completely tired tonight, and I do have to work tomorrow."

"Yeah, uh, sure. I'll call you again tomorrow then to explain. Goodnight Jordan." Jake sighed.

"Night Jake." Jordan closed the phone and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.


End file.
